Publication, Part of Autism Waiting Time Statistics
Autism Statistics, July 2024 to June 2025
Experimental statistics, Official statistics in development
Sub-ICB, ICB and Region breakdowns
In the previous edition of this publication, we issued a notice informing users that there was an issue with the sub-ICB, ICB and Region breakdowns affecting all financial years up to and including April 2023 to March 2024.
This issue meant the figures in the "Unknown" group were much higher than they should have been. All affected csv files were removed whilst we investigated the issue.
The issue has now been resolved, and all affected breakdowns and csv files are now reinstated for all time periods as of this edition.
There is, however, a minor outstanding issue affecting a limited amount of subnational 2019-20 data.
As a result, metrics ASD16f, ASD16g, ASD16h, ASD16i, ASD16j, ASD16k, ASD25, ASD25a and ASD25b within the ‘AutismStats_Apr2019_Mar2020_Region’ and ‘AutismStats_Apr2019_Mar2020_ICB’ CSV files are currently omitted. All other files contain the full set of metrics across the full time series
NHS England apologises for any inconvenience.
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Psych UK Limited data submissions from February 2025 onwards
A statement was included in the previous edition of this publication to note that the Psych UK Limited (DQT) provider submitted a single data submission for February 2025, leading to a peak in the number of open referrals for patients of all ages (ASD16, ASD16a and data quality metric ASD11) and for patients aged 18 years and over (ASD16d, ASD16e and data quality metric ASD11b) at England level in February 2025, followed by a drop the next month as they had not submitted any March 2025 data as of publication date. Our methodology to calculate the number of open referrals each month relies on a record for each referral being flowed in the month.
Psych UK Limited (DQT) has subsequently submitted March 2025 data, as well as data for all months since up to June 2025, and this is reflected in this edition of the publication. As a result, the increase for these measures between January and February 2025 is not a true reflection of increased activity but is in part a result of Psych UK Limited being included in these statistics from February 2025 onwards. Users can gain some understanding of the potential impact using the provider-level measures for Psych UK Limited (DQT) included in this publication.
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Methodology
Analytical approach
There is one main approach to autism waiting time statistics published here, contributing to an overall picture of the experience of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) diagnostic pathways.
The analysis takes the latest record of all referrals where the reason for the referral is suspected autism. For each month in the reporting period, we look at whether the referral was new, open at any point or closed in the month.
Waiting time to care contact approach
For waiting times, we use the referrals for suspected autism which were open within the month. We then look at the date of the first attended care contact related to those referrals if one has occurred. The waiting time taken here is the time from initial referral to the first care contact.
More detailed descriptions of the analysis undertaken can be found on the construction page of this publication, found here.
These statistics are based on the information collected from the Mental Health Services Dataset. Further detail on the information captured within the Mental Health Services Dataset (MHSDS) is available here.
Access the code used to create this report
From September 2023, the code used to create the outputs for this report is available on our NHS Digital GitHub webpage.
Last edited: 14 August 2025 10:15 am