Unpaid carers had more interactions with health care services than non-carers*, although this was not always a statistically significant difference.
Unpaid carers interacted with GPs more frequently than non-carers in all three geographical areas (rate ratio 1.3, 95% CI 1.2-1.3 in NPT; 1.3, 1.3-1.3 in Swansea; 1.2, 1.2-1.3 in Denbighshire).
More unpaid carers visited Emergency Departments than non-carers, significantly so in NPT (rate ratio 1.3, 95% CI 1.1-1.6) and Swansea (2.0, 1.5-2.8).
While more unpaid carers also had planned hospital stays across all areas, the difference was not statistically significant.
In Swansea, unpaid carers were significantly more likely to have emergency hospital admissions (2.0, 95% CI 1.3-3.2).
Outpatient visits were also more common among unpaid carers, significantly so in Swansea (1.3, 95% CI 1.1-1.7).
These higher rates of healthcare use among unpaid carers reflect their generally poorer health. However, health service data only provides information on health service use and may not represent need.
*Note: “non-carers” refers to an age, sex and geographical area matched population of individuals who were not identified in the unpaid carer population. For further details, see methodology doc.
Standardised rates show that LA-identified unpaid cares interacted with their GP more frequently than GP-identified carers. This suggests that there are other factors influencing the higher rates of GP interactions.
LA-identified unpaid carers visited GPs more frequently than GP-identified in both NPT and Denbighshire, (rate ratio 1.3, 95% CI 1.2-1.3 in NPT; 1.3, 1.2-1.3 in Denbighshire; Figure 5).
Even when age-sex standardised, rates showed that the LA-identified unpaid carers from NPT still had more GP interactions (rate ratio 1.2, 95% CI 1.1-1.2). This suggests that age alone can't explain the difference, and other factors must be influencing these higher rates of GP visits.
LA-identified unpaid carers interacted with secondary health services more frequently than GP-identified carers, although this was not always a statistically significant difference.
Although the rates of LA-identified unpaid carers with ED attendances, planned admissions, emergency admissions, and outpatient attendances were predominantly higher than GP-identified unpaid carers (excluding planned admissions in Swansea), the majority of these differences were not statistically significant (Figure 6).
The only exceptions were in NPT, where the rates of LA-identified unpaid carers with planned admissions (rate ratio 1.7, 95% CI 1.1-2.6) and outpatient attendance (1.3, 1.1-1.6) were significantly higher than GP-identified unpaid carers. This was due to the older ages of LA-identified carers.
Higher rates of secondary health service use by LA-identified than GP-identified unpaid carers were largely due to age differences between the populations. There is insufficient evidence to conclude whether there were any other factors influencing differences in secondary health care service use.