Sharon Hodgson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sharon Hodgson on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many children spent (a) up to two weeks, (b) two to four weeks, (c) four to six weeks and (d) more than six weeks in hospital immediately after being born in England in the last year for which figures are available.
Dr Daniel Poulter
The information requested is set out in the following table.
This is based on finished discharge episodes with a primary or secondary diagnosis of "Z38 – Live born infants according to place of birth", by length of stay for the year 2012/13 and covers activity in English NHS Hospitals and English NHS commissioned activity in the independent sector.
It should be noted that the length of stay in hospital is only available on the final episode of care in a hospital provider. Therefore the total of "other / unknown" lengths of stay recorded includes those births that have not resulted in a discharge, such as where the baby has been transferred to the care of another consultant.
|
Length of stay |
Finished Discharge Episodes |
|
Up to 2 weeks |
617,189 |
|
2-4 weeks |
5,227 |
|
4-6 weeks |
1,680 |
|
6 weeks+ |
1,778 |
|
Other/unknown |
47,133 |
Source: Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), Health and Social Care Information Centre
Notes:
1. Finished Discharge Episode: A discharge episode is the last episode during a hospital stay (a spell), where the patient is discharged from the hospital or transferred to another hospital.
2. Primary or secondary diagnosis: The number of episodes where this diagnosis was recorded in any of the 20 diagnosis fields in the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) record. Each episode is counted once, even if the diagnosis is recorded in more than one diagnosis field of the record.
3. ICD10 code: The following ICD10 code was used to identify a live born infant: Z38 – Live born infants according to place of birth.
4. Length of stay (duration of spell): The difference in days between the admission date and the episode end date (duration of episode) or discharge date (duration of spell), where both dates are given. LOS is based on hospital stays and only applies to ordinary admissions not day cases (unless otherwise stated). Information relating to LOS, including discharge method/destination, diagnoses and any operative procedures, is based only on the final episode of the spell.
