Updated: OHE Guide to UK Health and Health Care Statistics

This respected compilation contains data on demographics, expenditures, hospitals and workforce, and health services.

For nearly 40 years the OHE has been a specialist provider of data analytics to the health care and pharmaceutical sectors. The latest edition of the OHE Guide to UK Health and Health Care Statistics is now available online, providing both reliable statistics and a basic guide to their use.

For nearly 40 years the OHE has been a specialist provider of data analytics to the health care and pharmaceutical sectors. The latest edition of the OHE Guide to UK Health and Health Care Statistics is now available online, providing both reliable statistics and a basic guide to their use. Updated companion data tables and figures are available separately on the OHE website. Both may be downloaded free of charge.

Health and health care statistics are essential to making decisions about the allocation of limited health care resources. With the availability of so much data in hard copy and on the Internet, however, locating and accurately collating data sets can be both challenging and time consuming. OHE’s health statistics service navigates through this maze, meticulously preparing and presenting comparable data from reliable sources.

For those who may be gathering additional data, the OHE Guide also helps answer these important questions:

• What statistics do governmental and non‐governmental entities produce?
• What topics do they cover?
• How/where can such data be found?
• How can the data best be used and what help or advice about use is available?

The OHE Guide consists of four sections, a glossary and references.

• Section 1: Population statistics provide a description of demographic issues; population estimates and projections; mortality statistics and summary measures, including life expectancy and standardisation techniques; and the collection and use of morbidity and lifestyle statistics.
• Section 2: Health care expenditure statistics describe total public and private expenditure on health care in the UK, the structure and financing of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) and the costs of various activities.
• Section 3: Hospital activity and workforce statistics provide a detailed account of NHS data collection, concentrating mainly on hospital activities, waiting times and the workforce.
• Section 4: Family health services statistics include details about NHS Family Health Services for primary care, encompassing general medical, pharmaceutical, dental and ophthalmic services.

Each section includes tables and figures of important up-to-date statistics, discussion of issues that are common for that type of data, and notes about the key sources of information used by OHE. Information on methods used for collating and presenting reliable data also is offered where appropriate.

For further information about the services provided by OHE’s Health Statistics and Information team, please contact Dr Fraser Lewis, Head of Statistics.

Download: Hawe, E. and Cockcroft, L. (2013) OHE guide to UK health and health care statistics. Second edition. London: Office of Health Economics.