Mental Health Act Statistics, Annual Figures, 2023-24

In 2023-24 we report 52,458 new detentions, of which 36,686 took place at the point of admission to hospital. A further 12,435 occurred following admission. We also report 3,272 detentions following a place of safety order and 109 after the revocation of a CTO. Please see the "Are the MHSDS data complete?" section for guidance on interpreting data quality and completeness.

A slightly higher proportion of detentions occurred on admission in independent providers than NHS providers 68.8 per cent compared to 68.5 per cent. For independent providers, 25 per cent of detentions occurred following admission compared to 24.1 per cent in NHS facilities.

The headline detention figures for 2023-24 are up 2.2 per cent from last year. This does not represent the true change in detentions due to changes in data quality. MHSDS data quality (as the main data source) has improved and that from Acute providers making separate ECDS returns has increased. The ECDS is a relatively new dataset, therefore the number of submissions and data volumes are improving year on year. This year a number of new providers submitted detention data through ECDS which will affect the year on year change. To measure change more accurately, year on year differences in detentions are assessed on a subset of providers with stable data submission patterns. For further information please refer to the Background Data Quality Report.

In order to provide a like-for-like comparison to last year’s figures, we have limited our analysis to a smaller group of 24 providers (23 NHS and 1 independent). These providers all submitted data to KP90 in 2015-16. They all remained open to 2023-24, and submitted 12 months’ data about the Act to the MHSDS during each annual period. In addition our ongoing investigations did not reveal any significant data quality issues in their MHSDS data about the Act.

Using this methodology, our estimate for the true change in detentions from 2022-23 to 2023-24 is an increase of 2.5 per cent.

The following measures are included in the comparison:

• Detentions on admission
• Detentions following admission

We have not included detentions following use of section 136 and revocation of community treatment orders as completeness for these measures are affected by different factors.