Mental healthcare use and longer-term outcomes in people with co-occurring mental health conditions and alcohol/substance use disorder.

Data-sharing agreement from NHS England Data Uses Register. Evidence status: source reported.

Organisation: LANCASTER UNIVERSITY
Published: 2026-08-28
Source reference: DARS-NIC-690385-R5D4B-v2.6
Jurisdiction: England
Licence: Open Government Licence v3.0, subject to NHS England terms and exclusions

Register reference: DARS-NIC-690385-R5D4B-v2.6
Applicant type: Academic
Data controllers: LANCASTER UNIVERSITY
Agreement period: 2026-08-28 to 2029-08-27
For commercial purposes (as marked in the register): No
Release files listed by NHS England: 0

Data approved

Alcohol Dependency Dataset
Civil Registrations of Death
Hospital Episode Statistics Accident and Emergency (HES A and E)
Hospital Episode Statistics Admitted Patient Care (HES APC)
Hospital Episode Statistics Outpatients (HES OP)
Mental Health Services Data Set (MHSDS)
Uncurated Low Latency Hospital Data Sets - Emergency Care

Objective, as published

The Data will be used for the purpose of a research project: Mental healthcare use and longer-term outcomes in people with co-occurring mental health conditions and alcohol/substance use disorder. It is estimated that adults in England with a mental health disorder are more than twice as likely to suffer from an alcohol use disorder (AUD) and substance use disorder (SUD) than the general population, whilst almost two thirds of service users in drug and alcohol treatment report a need for mental health treatment. For individuals with a mental health condition, comorbid AUD and SUD is associated with worsened clinical outcomes, increased mortality rate, and reduced treatment adherence. Likewise, comorbid mental health conditions are associated with a reduced likelihood of remission from alcohol dependence and increased relapse risk. Comorbid AUD/SUD and other mental health conditions are also associated with high healthcare service utilisation. Individuals with co-occurring mental health conditions and AUD or SUD can respond to treatment and may respond similarly to those without an AUD/SUD if they remain in treatment. However, there are inequalities in access to care and treatment for people with co-occurring conditions, with co-occurring conditions more broadly associated with poorer treatment adherence, longer waiting times, and reduced appointment attendance. An understanding of the ways in which treatment pathways differ for individuals with and without an AUD/SUD may pro…

Expected benefits, as published

The findings of this research study are expected to contribute to evidence-based decision-making for policy-makers, local decision-makers such as doctors, and patients to inform best practice to improve the care, treatment and experience of health care users relevant to the subject matter of the study. Specifically, the findings of this research study could be used: • By health professionals providing care to individuals with a mental health disorder to understand which of their patients are most at risk of experiencing an AUD/SUD, and to therefore provide more targeted alcohol screening and referrals as part of their mental health care. • To inform broader guidelines and policies regarding alcohol and drug screening and referrals, to further ensure screening and referrals are provided to…

Benefits reported by the applicant

None of the expected benefits outlined in the DSA have been yielded to date.

This is the applicant's own account; OpenHDI has not verified it.

Source: https://digital.nhs.uk/services/data-access-request-service-dars/data-uses-register. Captured 2026-11-05.

Limitations: Data-sharing agreement as published in NHS England's Data Uses Register. An agreement permits access; actual data releases are listed separately. Expected and yielded benefits are as reported by the applicant and have not been independently verified. Long text fields can be cut off in NHS England's spreadsheet export at Excel's 32,767-character cell limit.