Learning disability inpatient activity
Financial Years 1997/98 - 2022/23

About this release

This release by Public Health Scotland (PHS) provides long-term trend information on patients with learning disabilities that were treated in Scottish psychiatric hospitals (1997/98 - 2022/23).

Main points

• The number of patient discharges from the Learning Disability specialty fell sharply from around 4,700 in 1997/98 to around 1,700 in 2005/06. The decrease continues gradually until 2020/21 (324). This reflects changes in service delivery, moving away from long term hospital care towards more community-based care. Patient discharges increased slightly between 2020/21 and 2021/22 to 402 and to 511 in 2022/23, which may represent a return to anticipated activity levels following relaxation of measures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Figure 1: Trend in discharges, continuous inpatient stays and patients discharged from the Learning Disability specialty in Scotland, 1997/98 - 2022/23

Close

Discharges from the Learning Disability specialty in Scotland, 1997/98 – 2022/23

For the time period 2017/18 to 2022/23:

• 69.1% of the discharges from the Learning Disability specialty were for people in the under 25 age group; the number of discharges then reduces sharply as age increases.
• Of the people who had an episode of inpatient care within the learning disability specialty, there were 3 times more people who live in the most deprived areas.
• Over 99% of discharges from the Learning Disability specialty were regular discharges. Less than 1% of discharges were irregular or discharges where the patient was deceased.
• 71.3% of stays in the Learning Disability specialty were between 1-7 days, and 12.3% were longer than 90 days.

Background

This publication relates to patients receiving inpatient care in mental health (psychiatric) hospitals within the learning disability specialty. This information was previously published within the Hospital inpatient care of people with mental health problems in Scotland report, but then became a standalone publication in December 2019, accompanied by open data.

Further information

The next release of this publication will be subject to a forthcoming consultation.