Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many patients were admitted via accident and emergency with a primary diagnosis of a muscle or tendon injury in each month of the financial years (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12, (c) 2012-13, (d) 2013-14, (e) 2014-15, (f) 2015-16 and (g) 2016-17.

A count of unplanned accident and emergency (A&E) attendances¹ that resulted in a hospital admission², for primary diagnosis of 'muscle or tendon injury'³, by month, 2010-11 and 2016-17⁴ is provided in the table below.

This is a count of hospital attendances resulting in admissions, not individual patients as the same person may have been admitted into a National Health Service hospital on more than one occasion.

Notes:

¹The following attendance category codes identify unplanned A&E attendances:

1 = First A&E attendance

3 = Follow-up A&E attendance – unplanned

9 = Not known

²Attendance disposal 01 = Admitted to hospital bed / become a lodged patient of the same health care provider.

³A&E Diagnosis - Please note that the recording of the diagnosis field within the A&E data set is not mandatory. It is not known to what extent changes over time are as a result of improvements in recording practice.

07 = Muscle/tendon injury

⁴HES figures are available from 2007-08 onwards. Changes to the figures over time need to be interpreted in the context of improvements in data quality and coverage and changes in NHS practice. For example, changes in activity may be due to changes in the provision of care. It should be noted that HES include activity ending in the year in question and run from April to March, e.g. 2012-13 includes activity occurring between 1 April 2012 and 31 March 2013.