Table 1. Activity, waiting times and outcomes in the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies programme, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 2012–2018.

Variable	Year
	2012–2013	2013–2014	2014–2015	2015–2016	2016–2017	2017–2018	2018–2019
Activitya
No. of patient referrals received, millions	0.88	1.12	1.27	1.40	1.39	1.44	1.60
No. of referrals where patient entered treatment, millions	0.43	0.71	0.82	0.95	0.97	1.01	1.09
No. of referrals where patient finished treatment, millions	0.14	0.36	0.47	0.54	0.57	0.55	0.58
Mean no. of treatment appointments per finished course of treatmentb	NR	NR	6.30	6.40	6.60	6.80	6.90
Waiting timesa
No. (%) of referrals where patient started treatment within 4 weeks, millionsc	0.27 (63.3)	0.44 (61.4)	0.55 (66.9)	0.71 (74.3)	0.76 (78.8)	0.80 (79.6)	0.85 (78.2)
Outcomea
No. (%) of referrals with reliable improvement of patient, millionsd	0.08 (57.5)	0.22 (59.7)	0.29 (60.8)	0.33 (62.2)	0.37 (65.1)	0.37 (66.4)	0.39 (67.4)
No. (%) of referrals with recovery of patient, millionse	0.05 (42.8)	0.14 (45.0)	0.19 (44.9)	0.23 (46.3)	0.26 (49.3)	0.26 (50.8)	0.28 (52.1)
No. (%) of referrals with reliable recovery of patient, millionse	0.05 (40.9)	0.14 (42.8)	0.18 (42.8)	0.22 (44.0)	0.25 (47.0)	0.25 (48.3)	0.27 (49.5)
Employment support
No. of referrals where patient finished a course of treatment and was in employment at the start, millions	0.07	0.18	0.24	0.28	0.31	0.32	0.34
No. of referrals where patient finished a course of treatment and was in employment at the end, millions	0.07	0.17	0.23	0.27	0.29	0.30	0.33
No. (%) of referrals where patient finished a course of treatment and was employed at the start and end, millionsf	0.06 (43.9)	0.15 (42.0)	0.21 (43.9)	0.24 (45.3)	0.27 (47.5)	0.28 (49.8)	0.30 (51.1)
No. (%) of referrals where patient moved off sick pay and benefitsf	3683 (2.6)	10 982 (3.0)	15 312 (3.3)	17 925 (3.3)	18 628 (3.3)	17 779 (3.2)	18 039 (3.1)

^a Indicators used in the United Kingdom’s National Health Service’s annual report. Referrals are the primary entity being counted. A referral constitutes an episode of care for a patient (it is possible for a single patient to be referred more than once).

^b Appointments are the way in which patients’ contact with services are recorded.

^c The denominator is the number of referrals where the patient entered treatment.

^d A patient has shown reliable improvement if they have a significant improvement in their condition following a course of treatment. Improvement is measured by the difference between their first and last scores on questionnaires tailored to their specific condition. The denominator is the number of referrals where the patient completed treatment.

^e Recovery in the programme is measured in terms of caseness, a term which means a referred patient has severe enough symptoms of anxiety or depression to be regarded as a clinical case. A referred patient has moved to recovery if they were a case at the start of their treatment, and not by the end of their treatment, as measured by scores from questionnaires tailored to their specific condition. A referred patient has reliably recovered if they meet the criteria for both the recovery and reliable improvement measures. The denominator is the number of referrals for patients who completed treatment minus those not at caseness.

^f The denominator is the number of referrals where the patient finished a course of treatment.

NR: not recorded.

Notes: We extracted data from the annual report on the use of Improving Access to Psychological Therapies services for England.¹⁰ State-provided health care is run separately in the four constituent countries of the United Kingdom, of which England is one. Taking 2018–2019 as an example, the data were collected from 1 April 2018 to 31 March 2019.