Private Healthcare Statistics


The National Health Service in the UK is beset by problems and there is considerable bureaucracy involved. Statistics are available for various things in the NHS but it is not often that the public have access to them. Private healthcare statistics are not so easy to assess or to locate as many health providers monitor their own services rather than general statistics on healthcare. The take up of private healthcare and the statistics quoted in newspapers are often the result of general surveys on private healthcare.

Private Healthcare Statistics

Private Healthcare Providers and Research Firms

There are private healthcare providers that team with research firms to draw out private health statistics but there is very little under the auspices of office of national statistics. According to a report in the Guardian on private healthcare statistics, however, during the last eighteen months of the previous government the take up of private care dropped from 14% of the population to 10% but that has started to rise again under the coalition.

Private Dentistry

One of the areas where considerable work has gone into the production of private healthcare statistics is dentistry. While some general figures are available to the public, because the research reports are produced by the private sector you have to pay for the full report. A study analysing trends in NHS dentistry and the extra take up of private dental services estimates that the private dentistry market in the UK is now worth around £5.7bn and likely to rise over the next five years as further changes to the NHS are made by the coalition government.

Mental Health Care

While many private healthcare providers do not cover mental illness, the number that does is growing rapidly and there is much greater mental health provision now in the private sector than ever before. Private healthcare statistics on mental health tend to suggest that there is now a growing number of private mental hospitals. While it is possible to download the executive summary of private healthcare statistics regarding the care of the mentally ill, you have to purchase the report, which is very expensive and produced in collaboration with a private research company Laing and Buisson to access any of the actual figures.

Care of the Elderly

Private healthcare and homes for the elderly is on the increase as Government cutbacks in this area have closed a number of homes in the public sector. Until 2010 the demand for private care for the elderly had remained stable but reports on private healthcare statistics tend to suggest that there will be growth in this sector during 2011/2012 as more council homes close and by 2020 it is projected that more than 420,000 elderly people will be in private healthcare homes. The current share of the demand on private homes for the elderly was projected at 40% of payees during the last year and is set to continue growing under the present government. In addition to the previous private healthcare statistics it is estimated that third party top up may be higher than was previously estimated.


Back to Top