NHS Digital

The Health and Social Care Act 2012 sets out the responsibilities of NHS Digital, formerly the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), which include:

  • collecting, analysing and presenting national health and social care data
  • setting up and managing national IT systems
  • publishing a Code of Practice to set out how the personal confidential information of patients should be handled and managed by health and care staff and organisations
  • building up a library of ‘indicators’ that can be used to measure the quality of health and care services provided to the public
  • acting to reduce how much paperwork doctors, nurses and care workers have to complete
  • helping health and care organisations improve the quality of the data they collect
  • creating a register of all the information it collects and produces, and publishing that information in a range of different formats

NHS Digital provides, sponsors or is responsible for the following surveys that are available from the UK Data Service: National Child Measurement Programme; Adult Dental Health Survey; Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey; Health Survey for England; Infant Feeding Survey; Smoking, Drinking and Drug Use among Young People; Survey of Carers in Households.