FOI-03945

Request   You asked us:   Under the FOIA, please a provide a breakdown of the available data for patients prescribed CNS stimulants and drugs for ADHD as per the following :     a) Please provide the number of patients prescribed CNS stimulants and drugs for ADHD per age bracket (e.g. 10-14) per NHS care board with a separate breakdown for gender for each of the last 10 years. Please separately provide the total population of such cohorts within the care board area for each gender (so as to enable a patient per 1000 population calculation).   b) Please provide the number of patients prescribed CNS stimulants and drugs for ADHD per age bracket (e.g. 10-14) per quintile 1 for highest deprivation with a separate breakdown of figures for each gender. Please separately provide the total population of such cohorts within the quintile per gender (so as toenable a patient per 1000 population calculation).   Please refer to the following summary for consistency with the above categorisations:   https://nhsbsa-opendata.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/mumh/mumh_0404_2425_v001.html   ness Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on 3 July 2026 .    We have handled your request  under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000.   Our response   I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds some of the information you have requested and a copy of the information is attached.   Please read the below notes to ensure correct understanding of the data.   Background:   NHSBSA Prescription Services process prescriptions and information is then used to make payments to pharmacists and appliance contractors (in England) for prescriptions dispensed in primary care settings. This involves processing approximately 1 billion prescription items and payments totalling over £9 billion each year. The information gathered from this process is then used to provide information on costs and trends in prescribing in England and Wales to over 25,000 registered NHS and Department of Health users.   Data Source:    NHSBSA Information Services Data Warehouse   NHSBSA copy of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) postcode to Lower Super Output Area (LSOA) lookup tables 2021.   NHSBSA copy of the English indices of deprivation 2025.   Contents:   Data on prescribing of drugs in BNF Section 0404 - CNS stimulants and drugs used for ADHD.   Time Period:   Data covers the period January 2016 to December 2025, split into calendar years.   Organisation Level:   The data is shown for all prescribing in England. Split by ICB for open prescribing practices and the equivalent level 4 organisation at the time of closure for closed prescribing organisations.   If a patient was prescribed medicines in multiple ICBs during the year then they will be shown in each ICB.   Drugs:   All drugs in BNF Section 0404 - CNS stimulants and drugs used for ADHD. These medicines are classified by their primary therapeutic indication. However, it is possible that they can be prescribed for other reasons outside of this primary therapeutic indication. The clinical indication of a prescription is not captured by NHSBSA during processing, and therefore we cannot determine the reason that a prescription was issued.   Gender:   Patient gender has been reported using the latest patient gender information held by the NHSBSA Information Services data warehouse at the time that the data was extracted. This uses information from either the most recent Electronic Prescription Service (EPS) message or from the last time that NHSBSA received data about the patient's gender from NHS Personal Demographics Service.   Gender is either: Male, Female, Not Known (where no information is held) or Indeterminate (where information is held which does not confirm either Male or Female, intentionally or otherwise). Where patients are recorded with different genders within the same ICB and calendar year they are counted under both genders.   Age:   NHSBSA stores information on the age of the recipient of each prescription as it was read by computer from images of paper prescriptions or as attached to message sent through the electronic prescription system.    NHSBSA data warehouse applies a calculated age logic shown that checks for any inconsistent information across the available sources and may result in ages being reported as missing or unknown. This is explained in more detail here:  https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/sites/default/files/2018-02/180115%20Age%20Logic%20Summary%20Flow%20Chart%20-%20Revised%20Layout.pdf     Additional checks have been carried out to assess the capture rate and accuracy of the stored patient information from scanned prescriptions. The latest results for 2020 showed that for both paper and electronic prescriptions patient age was captured from 94.88% of prescription forms and the accuracy of scanned age data was 99.95%.   If a patient moved from one age band to another during the calendar year, then their older age is given.   IMD Quintile:   IMD quintiles have been calculated by taking the prescriber's postcode and assigning that to an LSOA using the NHSBSA copy of the ONS postcode to LSOA lookup tables. Where a postcode crosses LSOA boundaries the LSOA with the lowest LSOA alpha-numeric code has been used. We then looked up the deprivation score of the LSOA in the 2025 English indices of deprivation using the NHSBSA copy of these indices.   If a patient was prescribed by multiple organisations with different IMD quintiles they will be counted under both quintiles.   Patient counts:   Patients who could not be identified by means of a valid NHS number on the prescription are excluded. The figures for the number of identifiable patients should not be combined and reported at any other level than provided as this may result in the double counting of patients.   For this request 87.4% of in-scope items were for identified patients.   Exclusions:   The data excludes items dispensed in prisons, hospital and private prescriptions but does include dental, prison and hospital prescriptions which are dispensed in the community.    If a prescription was issued but not presented for dispensing or was not submitted to NHSBSA Prescription Services by the dispenser, then it is not included in the data provided.   Items supplied under NHS pharmacy advanced services are not included.   b) ...Please separately provide the total population of such cohorts within the quintile per gender (so as toenable a patient per 1000 population calculation) .   NHSBSA does not hold the population data you have requested and has therefore not provided this information. You may wish to contact the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which produces Lower Layer Super Output Areas (LSOAs) as part of census data processing. We are unable to advise whether gender-specific population data is available at this geographical level.   Data Queries   Please contact  [email protected]  ensuring you quote the above reference if you have any specific questions regarding this response; or, if you feel you may be misunderstanding or misinterpreting the information; or, if you plan on publishing the data.   Reusing the data and copyright   If you plan on producing a press or broadcast story based upon the data please contact  [email protected] . This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented.   The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is subject to NHSBSA copyright. This information is licenced under the terms of the Open Government Licence detailed at:   http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/     Should you wish to re-use the information you must include the following statement:  “Data Warehouse, NHSBSA Copyright 2026”.  F ailure to do so is a breach of the terms of the licence.   Information you receive which is not subject to NHSBSA Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. Please obtain their permission before reproducing any third party (non NHSBSA Copyright) information.