DATA · NHS ADHD MANAGEMENT INFORMATION
What the NHS ADHD figures actually include.
The numbers on our homepage come straight from NHS England. This page explains what they refer to and why our figure is smaller than the one you may have seen elsewhere.
These are management information, not a definitive count of people waiting. NHS England describes the publication as new and subject to further development.
In a nutshell
- These are referral records, not people. One person can have more than one referral.
- They cover records submitted to the Mental Health Services Data Set in England. They do not cover every ADHD pathway.
- Earlier months can be revised up or down, so every number needs its data period and source release beside it.
01
Why our number is smaller than the one you have seen
You may have seen a figure of almost 960,000 quoted in the news or on other websites. That total combined referrals recorded in mental health services with a separate community paediatrics estimate.
NHS England is removing the community paediatrics measure from this publication in November 2026, after which it will appear in the Community Health Services waiting list publication instead. A card built on the combined total would appear to drop by roughly 180,000 overnight, with nothing having changed for anybody waiting.
We therefore report the mental health services component on its own, so that what you read this quarter can be compared with what you read next quarter. The smaller number is the more careful one.
02
What the figures count
Referrals, not people.
The open referrals figure counts referral records held open in NHS mental health services in England that may relate to ADHD. An individual can have more than one referral record. Someone who has already been diagnosed and is receiving medication reviews or continuing care may still hold an open referral, so the figure is not a queue of people waiting for a first appointment.
The category can also include other neurodevelopmental referrals, because services do not always record ADHD separately from the wider pathway. NHS England is explicit that these figures cannot give a definitive count of people waiting specifically for an ADHD assessment.
The new referrals figure counts referrals recorded as starting in a single month. It is a flow rather than a queue. Both figures on the card cover the same reporting month.
The downloadable national file does not contain a separate total row. We add the five published age groups, including “Unknown”. Source cells are rounded to the nearest five; values from one to four are suppressed. The automatic update stops for review if a latest headline would depend on a suppressed cell.
03
What the figures miss
The gaps matter as much as the contents, particularly if you are using Right to Choose.
Right to Choose and private referrals
A Right to Choose or private referral appears here only if the provider submits it to the Mental Health Services Data Set and it is captured by this methodology. Independent providers began contributing from February 2025, so figures from that point are not directly comparable with earlier months.
Children seen by community paediatrics
Children and young people are often assessed by community paediatrics rather than mental health services. NHS England is discontinuing that component of this publication from November 2026 and directing users to community-health waiting-list data instead. We exclude it from the homepage now so the headline remains comparable after that change.
Anywhere outside England
This publication covers England. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland collect and publish separately, and Right to Choose does not apply outside England.
Anyone who never got referred
Some services screen referrals before accepting them, and some people never reach a referral at all. Neither group can be counted in a referrals dataset.
04
The figures change after publication
Services submit data late, and providers resubmit corrected data. NHS England restates earlier months accordingly, and the restatements are not always upwards. A month can change in a later release because of a late submission, a correction or a resubmission.
Two consequences worth holding on to. Any figure shown here is provisional and may be revised. And year-on-year comparisons are weaker than they appear, because a rise can reflect improved reporting rather than increased demand. That is why we do not put a percentage increase on the homepage.
Revisions detected by our feed
This log shows only values that NHS England changed for an already published month. A range means one source cell was suppressed as a value from one to four.
05
How we keep this up to date
NHS England publishes this series quarterly, in February, May, August and November. We check for a new release once a day, download the published CSV, and record a fingerprint of the file. If the file changes without the address changing, which happens when data is resubmitted, we treat it as a new version and keep the old one.
Figures are only published here once they pass validation. If a release does not parse as expected, or a value moves by more than we would expect, the new release is held for review. In the meantime the card continues to show the last figures that did validate and says that a review or fetch problem exists.
If our automatic check itself stops running, the card says so rather than implying the figures were confirmed today. The date on the card is the date we last successfully checked the source, which is a different thing from the date the data covers and the date NHS England published it. All three appear on the card for that reason.