Statistics, Document

NHS activity and capacity during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic: 27 May 2021

Data on coronavirus and NHS activity and capacity up to 25 May 2021.

First published: 27 May 2021

Last updated: 27 May 2021

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In response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, daily information on health care has been produced to support transparency and understanding of the NHS activity and capacity. The release includes figures on invasive ventilated beds by use, admissions and hospitalisations of COVID-19 related patients, and attendances to Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments.

We are considering changing the content of this release and welcome your feedback on how you use the data published here, and our proposed changes. Please see the quality and methodology information section for more detail on these proposals.

Please note that Cardiff and Vale were unable to supply hospital data for the 25 May 2021 due to a failed systems upgrade. Hospital data from Cardiff and Vale for 24 May 2021 has been used as a proxy for 25 May 2021 and will be revised on 26 May 2021. This revision will be published on our StatsWales website on 27 May 2021.

Main points

The number of new daily admissions with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 fluctuates, taking that into account, the 7 day rolling average has generally decreased since early January 2021 but has plateaued since early April 2021. The number of new daily admissions is currently similar to the lowest levels since reporting began on 1 April 2020.
In the last 7 days, an average of 17 people a day were admitted to hospital as confirmed or suspected with COVID-19. This compares to an average of 13 for the week to 18 May 2021.
The total number of beds occupied with COVID-19 related patients (confirmed, suspected and recovering) increased from the end of September 2020 and reached its highest level on 12 January 2021, at 2,879 patients. Since then, despite fluctuations, the number of beds occupied with COVID-19 related patients has generally decreased.
As at 25 May 2021, 178 beds were occupied with COVID-19 related patients (confirmed, suspected and recovering), representing 2.2% of all hospitalisations. This is a slight increase from 163 on 18 May 2021 (2.0% of all hospitalisations) and is currently similar to the lowest levels since reporting began on 1 April 2020.
As at 25 May 2021, there have been reductions in the number of beds occupied with confirmed and recovering COVID-19 patients. The number of beds occupied with suspected patients has increased slightly from the week ending 18 May 2021. This increase in suspected COVID-19 patients has contributed to the overall increase in the number of COVID-19 related patients.
As at 25 May 2021, 4 invasive ventilated beds were occupied with COVID-19 related patients (confirmed and suspected), and are now at similar levels to September 2020. This compares to 3 on 18 May 2021 and to 164 at the peak in April 2020.

Accompanying tables for this release are available, including all the data shown below and also data concerning general and acute beds.

Statistics on 111 and NHS Direct calls, NHS staff absence and emergency ambulance calls are available on StatsWales as well as all other statistics in this release.

Additionally, information on beds, hospitalisations and admissions is published on weekdays at 12pm, on StatsWales containing data up to the previous day. After 12pm on Thursdays, the data shown in this release will not contain the most up to date published data. However, this weekly release provides additional commentary on trends in the data.

The data are taken from management information and are subject to change. They have not been subject to the same validation processes undertaken for official statistics releases. Where available, the official statistics should continue to be considered the authoritative source of data. Please see the Chief Statistician’s blog for more information on reporting management information, data quality and transparency.

Hospital activity and capacity

This section covers the number of admissions and hospitalisations of COVID-19 related patients and invasive ventilated beds occupied with COVID-19 related patients, to support transparency and provide an understanding of NHS activity and capacity during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hospital coverage has changed over time, please see the quality and methodology information section for more information.

Hospital admissions

Chart 1 shows that after the peak in April, admissions of patients with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 reached a high point on 30 December 2020 before decreasing again.

Patients admitted to hospital as suspected or confirmed with COVID-19, from 1 April 2020 (MS Excel)

Notes

Admissions are the number of patients admitted to hospital between 9am on the update date and 9am the day before. COVID-19 related admissions include COVID-19 suspected or confirmed patients.

Please see the quality and methodology information section for the complete set of notes and historical changes relating to admission figures.

Main points

The number of new daily admissions with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 fluctuates, taking that into account, the 7 day rolling average has generally decreased since early January 2021 but has plateaued since early April 2021. The number of new daily admissions is currently similar to the lowest levels since reporting began on 1 April 2020.
In the last 7 days, an average of 17 people a day were admitted to hospital with confirmed or suspected COVID-19. This compares to an average of 13 for the week to 18 May 2021.

Hospitalisations

Chart 2 shows the number of people in hospital with COVID-19 reached its highest level on 12 January 2021 before decreasing again.

Number of people in hospital as suspected, confirmed or recovering with COVID-19, from 1 April 2020 (MS Excel)

Notes

Recovering patients was a category introduced on 26 May 2020 to capture patients who were COVID-19 positive in hospital and who showed no symptoms for 14+ days but remained in hospital on a COVID-19 treatment pathway, often for rehabilitation. There have been some differences in reporting by health boards in the time series which are outlined in more detail in the quality and methodology information section.

Please see the Chief Statistician’s blog for more information on reporting on recovering patients.

To ensure accurate and consistent reporting of Covid-19 recovering patients in the hospitalisations data, all health boards were reminded to follow the national guidance for SITREP reporting, and asked to ensure any necessary changes to their daily reporting were implemented by 12 April 2021. Contrary to the guidance, some health boards were counting long stay patients who had fully recovered from COVID-19 in the COVID-19 recovering category, rather than the non-COVID-19 category, which inflated the number of COVID-19 recovering patients. This change resulted in a step-change decrease in the number of recovering patients (a decrease of around 123 patients at the point of implementation). Whilst the impact was seen across most health boards, it mainly impacted the Swansea Bay University Health Board.

Please see the quality and methodology information section for the complete set of notes and historical changes relating to hospitalisation figures.

Main points

The number of beds occupied with COVID-19 related patients is currently similar to the lowest levels since reporting began on 1 April 2020.
The total number of beds occupied with COVID-19 related patients (confirmed, suspected and recovering) increased from the end of September 2020 and reached its highest level on 12 January 2021 (2,879 patients). Since then, despite some fluctuations, the total number has been generally falling.
The number of confirmed COVID-19 patients and the number of recovering COVID-19 patients peaked at different times; with highest numbers of confirmed patients occurring early in January 2021 (1,643 on 4 January 2021) and highest numbers of recovering patients seen a few weeks later (1,192 on 31 January 2021).

As at 25 May 2021

There have been reductions in the number of beds occupied with confirmed and recovering COVID-19. The number of beds occupied with suspected patients has increased slightly in the latest week. This slight increase in suspected COVID-19 patients has contributed to the overall increase in the number of COVID-19 related patients.
178 beds were occupied with COVID-19 related patients (confirmed, suspected and recovering), representing 2.2% of all hospitalisations. Of these, 11 were occupied with confirmed COVID-19 patients, 85 with recovering patients and 82 with suspected COVID-19 patients.

Invasive ventilated beds

Number of invasive ventilated beds by use, from 1 April 2020 (MS Excel)

Notes

Baseline relates to the number of beds that were available prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. There are usually 152 critical care beds available. Invasive ventilated beds include beds in and outside a critical care setting, and include surge capacity. COVID-19 patients in this chart include suspected, confirmed, and recovering COVID-19 patients. Recovering patients were only included from 26 May 2020 to the 18 January 2021.

Please see the quality and methodology information section for the complete set of notes and historical changes relating to the invasive ventilated beds figures.

Main points

The number of occupied invasive ventilated beds generally increased from September 2020, reaching a high of 150 on 12 January 2021, but has decreased since to levels seen in September 2020.

As at 25 May 2021

4 invasive ventilated beds were occupied with COVID-19 related patients. This compares to 3 on 18 May 2021 and to 164 (160 fewer occupied beds) at the peak in April 2020.
145 invasive ventilated beds were occupied with non-COVID-19 related patients. This compares to 154 (9 fewer occupied beds) on 18 May 2021.
There were 67 vacant invasive ventilated beds that could be staffed. This compares to 68 (1 fewer bed) on 18 May 2021.

Information on healthcare presented in the UK Government COVID-19 dashboard and in the Public Health Wales (PHW) dashboard differ from this publication. Please see the quality and methodology information section and the comparability with other publications section for more information.

A&E attendances

Digital Health and Care Wales have been unable to provide the ‘Attendances in NHS Wales accident and emergency departments’ dataset to Welsh Government due to a data processing issue. The publication of this dataset has been postponed and we will publish this information as soon as possible. Therefore, the A&E figures and chart have not been updated since the last publication.

This section covers daily information on attendances to Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments in Wales, to further support transparency and provide an understanding of NHS activity and capacity during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The data are taken from management information and are subject to change. The latest data have not been subject to the same validation processes undertaken for official statistics releases. The official statistics should continue to be considered the authoritative source of data.

Please see the Chief Statistician’s blog for more information on reporting management information, data quality and transparency.

Chart 4 shows that A&E attendances fell sharply from mid-March 2020 and increased gradually from April 2020 to the 2015 to 2019 average, but they have now reached similar levels to the 2015 to 2019 average.

Number of daily A&E attendances to major and minor hospitals, from 1 January 2015 (MS Excel)

Notes

A&E attendances to major and minor hospitals, from all mode of transports across Wales. Some small minor A&E units are not able to submit daily data, therefore there is probably a small undercount in total attendance. The five-year average uses data from the years 2015 to 2019. For data on the 29 February, only data from the year 2016 and 2020 is included. There tends to be a lower number of attendances recorded on a Sunday compared to other days of the week and a higher recorded number of attendances in the summer compared to the winter.

Please see the quality and methodology information section for the complete set of notes and historical changes relating to A&E figures.

Main points

During March 2020, A&E attendances fell sharply to below half of the usual level. Attendances gradually increased from early April 2020, but generally remained below the 2015 to 2019 average.
Since mid-January 2021, A&E attendances have been increasing, reaching similar levels to the 2015 to 2019 average.

Quality and methodology information

The data are taken from management information and are subject to change. They have not been subject to the same validation processes undertaken for official statistics releases. However, they are provided to support transparency and understanding of NHS activity at this time. The official statistics should continue to be considered the authoritative source of data.

Historic data are subject to revisions and therefore may differ slightly to previously published information.

Proposed content changes for future releases

With the number of coronavirus cases decreasing over the last few months, we are considering changing the content of this release, as outlined below. We welcome your feedback on how you use the data published in this release, and any changes we are proposing.

NHS staff absence and self-isolation rate

This information is currently published each Thursday on StatsWales. Our proposal is to move this collection from weekly to fortnightly initially.

This data collection was introduced early in the pandemic to help understand and manage capacity within the NHS to rapidly respond to the changing needs and priorities. This data collection is resource intensive for NHS organisations and, as staff absence due to COVID is no longer a major factor in delivering critical NHS services, we want to reduce the burden on organisations who collect and supply this data.

Attendances in NHS Wales’ accident and emergency departments

This information is currently published within this statistical release and also on StatsWales each Thursday. Our proposal is to remove this section from the statistical release and no longer update this data.

At the start of the pandemic, official statistic on attendances at A&E departments were paused, and we introduced daily data taken from management information. However, official statistics on A&E attendances are once again published every month as part of the NHS activity and performance statistical release. Also, in recent months the data shows that attendances are now similar levels to the 2015-19 average.

Calls made to 111 and NHS direct

This is currently published each Thursday on StatsWales. Our proposal is to no longer update this data.

Calls to 111 and NHS direct are published by Public Health Wales on their Rapid COVID-19 surveillance dashboard. Information is available for all calls and the proportion of calls that are for any COVID-19 like symptoms. The information is available at health board level.

Emergency ambulance calls, by date

This is currently published each Thursday on StatsWales. Our proposal is to no longer update this data.

At the start of the pandemic, official statistic on emergency calls to the ambulance service were paused, and we introduced daily data taken from management information. However, official statistics on calls to the ambulance service are once again published every month as part of the NHS activity and performance statistical release.

Hospital activity and capacity

The health minister announced on 13 March 2020 that all non-urgent activity should stop to prepare for the pandemic.

Following further validation, admissions and hospitalisation data prior to 1 April 2020 were decided to not be suitable for publication. Therefore, the time series begins on 1 April 2020.

Figures on hospitalisations and activity include data from acute hospitals from 1 April 2020, field hospitals from 20 April 2020, community hospitals from 23 April 2020, mental health units from 10 July 2020, and exclude data from private hospitals.