Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many consultant pathologists are employed by the NHS by (a) headcount and (b) whole time equivalent.

NHS England publishes Hospital and Community Health Services workforce statistics for England, which are available at the following link:

https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/nhs-workforce-statistics

These statistics include staff working in hospital trusts and integrated care boards, but excludes staff working in primary care, general practitioner surgeries, local authorities, and other providers. This data is drawn from the Electronic Staff Record (ESR), the human resources system for the National Health Service.

The data published by NHS England shows that, as of June 2024, there are 3,164 full-time equivalent and 3,515 headcount consultants in the pathology specialty group employed in NHS trusts and other core organisations in England.