Alcohol related hospital statistics
Scotland financial year 2023 to 2024

About this release

This release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) provides information on alcohol-related inpatient and day case activity within general acute and psychiatric hospitals in Scotland. This release covers general acute hospital activity for the financial years 1981/82 to 2023/24 and psychiatric hospital admissions from 1997/98 to 2023/24. Please note that for this December 2024 release, the 2022/23 and 2023/24 Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) rates analysis figures are based on 2021 SIMD mid-year population estimates. 2022 and 2023 SIMD mid-year population estimates produced by National Records of Scotland were not available at the time of publication. When these become available the relevant analysis will be rerun and if a significant impact on the 2022/23 or 2023/24 figures is seen a planned revision of published statistics will be undertaken. The Tableau dashboard published with previous editions in this series of publications has not been updated for this edition. Dashboard provision for this publication can be found on the ‘Wholly Attributable Alcohol Hospital Statistics’ pages in the Alcohol Consumption and Harms Dashboard.

Main Points

• In 2023/24 there were 32,301 alcohol-related hospital admissions (stays) in Scotland. The majority of alcohol-related hospital admissions (92%) occurred in general acute hospitals (29,829) with the remaining 8% of admissions (2,469) occurring in psychiatric hospitals.
• In 2023/24, the European Age-sex standardised rate of alcohol-related hospital admissions to general acute hospitals was 548 per 100,000 population and was 3% higher than the rate in 2022/23 (532 per 100,000).
• In 2023/24, males (539 patients per 100,000 population) were two times more likely than females (233 patients per 100,000 population) to be admitted to hospitals for conditions wholly attributable to alcohol.
• In 2023/24, people in the most deprived areas (942 patients per 100,000 population), as measured by SIMD, were six times more likely to be admitted to hospitals for conditions wholly attributable to alcohol than those in the least deprived areas (143 patients per 100,000 population).

Line graph of general acute hospitalisation rates for number of stays, number of patients, and number of new patients respectively by year.

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Alcohol-related hospitalisation rates, general acute hospitals, Scotland, 1981/82-2023/24

Background

Consumption of alcohol can result in a wide range of health problems. Some may occur after drinking over a relatively short period, such as acute intoxication (drunkenness) or poisoning (toxic effect). Others develop more gradually, such as damage to the liver and brain. Estimates of the number of inpatient and day case hospitalisations are based on counts where alcohol-related conditions are diagnosed during the hospital stay (see Metadata for more information).

Attendances at Accident and Emergency that do not result in an admission to hospital are not included in this report. Individuals may have more than one stay in hospital during a year, therefore the number of people admitted will be less than the total number of admissions.

Data presented for 01 April 2023 to 31 March 2024 are provisional and subject to change in future publications as figures will be updated to reflect more complete data from NHS Boards.

Further Information

The next release of this publication will be December 2025.