Health and Care Experience Survey 2023/24 Technical Report

Survey Response

Response rates

The response rate is calculated as the number of forms returned as a percentage of the number of survey invite letters sent out.

In total, out of an initial sample of 528,376 individuals, we sent out 526,758 survey packs, after excluding people as a result of death checks or for administrative reasons, such as having an incomplete address. We received 107,538 completed surveys back, which gives a response rate of 20%. This is lower than the response rate achieved in the 2021/22 survey (24%).

A number of practices that had been excluded from previous surveys due to low response rates were included in the 2023/24 survey. These included a number of practices associated with universities that historically had a low response rate. The inclusion of these practices in 2023/24 may have contributed to the lower overall response rate than in previous surveys.

The response rate has been broken down by age, sex, deprivation level, Urban / Rural location, list size of the general practice and Health and Social Care Partnership.

Many of these differences were also evident in previous surveys, and were taken into account when the sample sizes were calculated – see Section 4 on Sample Design for more information about this.

Response Rate by Age Group

The response rate increases with people’s age (Table 3). It was the highest in the 65+ age group (42%) and the lowest among the youngest group aged 17-34 (6%).

Older age groups are more likely to respond to the survey.

Response Rate by Sex

Table 4 shows that the response rate was higher for females (23%) than it was for males (18%). Sex is a variable linked from CHI records.

Females have a higher response rate than males.

Response Rate by Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation Quintile

Those who were sent a survey were assigned to a deprivation quintile based on their postcode using the 2020 Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD).This is a relative measure of deprivation. If an area is identified as ‘deprived’, this can relate to people having a low income, but it can also mean fewer resources or opportunities.

The response rate was lower for people living in more deprived areas (Table 5), ranging from 13% for people living in the most deprived areas to 26% for people living in the least deprived areas.

People living in more deprived areas are less likely to respond to the survey.

Response Rate by Urban / Rural Classification

Respondents were assigned to an Urban / Rural category based on their postcode, using the Scottish Government’s 2016 six-fold Urban / Rural classification. This classification is based on settlement size and drive time to an urban area.

The response rate was higher among people living in small towns and rural areas, and lower among people living in urban areas. It ranged from 16% for people living in large urban areas to 31% for people living in remote rural areas (Table 5).

The response rate is lower among people living in urban areas.

Response Rates by list size of the general practice

The list size is the number of patients registered at each general practice. Response rates are similar among people registered with general practices of different list sizes (Table 6).

The highest response rates were from practices with a list size of fewer than 2,500 patients at 22%. There was little difference between response rates for practices with a larger list size, who had a response rate of 20% or 21%.

The highest response rate was from General Practices with a list size of less than 2,500.

Response rate by Health and Social Care Partnership

Response rates by the Health and Social Care Partnership of the general practice are shown in Table 7. The highest response rate was 32%, achieved in Orkney. The lowest response rate was for Glasgow City at 13%.

Orkney Health and Social Care Partnership has the highest response rate

Method of Response

Of the 107,538 respondents, 56% completed the survey online and 43% sent their surveys back by post.

Compared with the 2021/22, the proportion of people completing the survey online has decreased (59 per cent in 2021/22) and the proportion of people completing a paper questionnaire and sending it back by post has increased (41 per cent in 2021/22). The higher proportion of people completing the survey online during 2021/22 could be partially explained by the COVID pandemic and the associated restrictions in place during at the time.

Less than 1 per cent of respondents completed the survey via the telephone and via the language line, which is similar to the previous round of the survey.

Table 8 below shows the number of responses and percentage of respondents by methods of response for the latest round of the survey (2023/24).

More than half of respondents completed the survey online

Note: The sum of the percentages does not equal 100 due to rounding