In 2015/16, NHS England introduced the first centralised national wheelchair dataset about wheelchair services. It was designed to improve transparency and benchmarking. This was essential to improving the commissioning of wheelchair services, and to improving outcomes for wheelchair users.

The questions that comprise the data collection were developed through significant discussion and feedback from wheelchair service providers, people who use wheelchairs, the National Wheelchair Managers Forum, Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), and other key stakeholders.

Data was collected quarterly from CCGs between July 2015 and June 2022, since July 2022 data has been collected from Integrated Care Boards (ICBs). This data supports the drive for improvements in wheelchair services. The collection has been published as an official statistics since quarter one of 2019-20 (April – June 2019).

The guidance to aid ICBs to collect data is available on the Wheelchair services: National Wheelchair Data Collection Guidance. Further information on the collection can be found on the NHS England website.

Data

From Quarter 1 of 2019/20 the data has been published as an official statistic. It is updated quarterly on the following webpages:

National Wheelchair Data Collection Quarterly Publication Files 2023-24
National Wheelchair Data Collection Quarterly Publication Files 2022-23
National Wheelchair Data Collection Quarterly Publication Files 2021-22
National Wheelchair Data Collection Quarterly Publication Files 2019-20

The collection was previously published as an experimental statistic from quarter two of 2015-16 (July – September 2015) to quarter four of 2018-19 (January – March 2019). The data can be downloaded from our website.

NOTE: Data collection was suspended between January 2020 and June 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coverage: England.

Aggregation: Integrated Care Boards (ICBs).

Date of next publication:

Publication is scheduled for the 9th May 2024.

Period covered by next publication:

January – March 2024

Contact Details

For more information about the dataset, or the ways in which NHS England is engaging with and supporting commissioners of wheelchair services, please contact england.wheelchairs@nhs.net.