§ Mr. GrahamTo ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many people have spent more than three months in hospital in(a) Scotland, (b) England, (c) Wales and (d) Northern Ireland in each year since 1979.
§ Mr. Michael Forsyth[holding answer 27 May 1988]: Detailed information including length of stay is held centrally only for NHS hospitals. Corresponding information is not held for private hospitals. Readily available information relates not to individual patients but to discharges (including deaths) of patients from hospital after separate episodes of care. The same patient may therefore be counted more than once. The information in the table relates to the number of discharges of patients after a stay of more than three months from all NHS hospitals, except maternity hospitals, in eayc country and in each calendar year. It does not include people who spent more than three months in hospital and who were still in hospital at the end of the year because information held centrally is incomplete. Many long-stay patients are therefore excluded.
Scotland England1 Wales Northern2Ireland 1979 10,321 93,700 5,288 3,070 1980 9,105 88,823 5,433 2,600 1981 9,656 87,599 5,331 2,990 1982 9,775 87,560 5,167 3,560 1983 10,193 86,540 5,062 3,380 1984 9,863 87,460 5,323 3,190 1985 10,299 84,830 5,257 2,700 1986 9,828 n.a. 4,974 3,330 1 The non-psychiatric component is estimated from a 10 per cent, sample of discharge records. 2 Excludes discharges from mental handicap hospitals.