Alcoholic Drinks: Misuse

Mr. Don Foster
To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many admissions via accident and emergency to NHS hospitals for alcohol-related conditions there were in 2006-07.

Dawn Primarolo
[holding answer 18 February 2008]: In 2006-07 there were 162,080 finished admission episodes via Accident and Emergency (A&E) where the primary or secondary diagnosis was alcohol related. This figure describes activity in national health service hospitals England and activity in the English independent sector, commissioned by English NHS.

Notes:

Finished admission episodes (FAE)

A FAE is the first period of in-patient care under one consultant within one healthcare provider. Admissions do not represent the number of in-patients, as a person may have more than one admission within the year.

All diagnoses count of mentions

These figures represent a count of all mentions of a diagnosis in any of the 14 diagnosis fields in the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) data set. Therefore, if a diagnosis is mentioned in more than one diagnosis field during an episode, all diagnoses are counted.

Emergency admission

These are the emergency admission codes to specify in more detail how the patient was admitted to hospital.

21 = Emergency: via A and E services, including the casualty department of the provider

28 = Emergency: other means, including patients who arrive via the A and E department of another health care provider

Alcohol related diagnoses

F10 - Mental and behavioural disorders due to use of alcohol.

T51 - Toxic effect of alcohol.

K70 - Alcoholic liver disease.

Data quality

HES are compiled from data sent by over 300 NHS trusts and primary care trusts (PCTs) in England. The Information Centre for health and social care liaises closely with these organisations to encourage submission of complete and valid data and seeks to minimise inaccuracies and the effect of missing and invalid data via HES processes. While this brings about improvement over time, some shortcomings remain.

Source:

HES, The Information Centre for health and social care.