GIDS Waiting List Size per Quarter – all years held

Reference: 24-25408

Date response sent: 14/01/2025

Details of enquiry

please provide the following information regarding the number of patients on the waiting list for the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) over time:

1. As far back as records are held, please provide the number of patients on the waiting list for their first GIDS appointment at a regular point within each financial quarter.
2. Please provide these data for each individual GIDS clinic separately and for the service as a whole (GIDS-wide).
3. Please provide these data separately for patients assigned male at birth and those assigned female at birth, and in combination regardless of sex assigned at birth, at both the GIDS-wide and individual clinic level.

Response sent

Explanatory Notes about our response:

A. The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust did not hold data by GIDS clinic location, as the GIDS did not differentiate its data by clinic location. GIDS service provision was nationwide and managed as one service with one waiting list. Individual clinicians would cover several GIDS clinic locations

B. The Trust holds GIDS Referral and GIDS Waiting List data from Financial Year 2001/02 to 2022/23, with the following * exceptions:

• From July 2021: GIDS referrals from General Practitioners and other non-CAMHS/paediatric referrers were handled by Arden and GEM CSU on behalf of NHS England
• From October 2022 all new referrals from any referrer were redirected to Arden & GEM CSU.
• From 23 March 2023, The whole GIDS waiting list and all new referrals were managed by Arden and GEM. GIDS no longer held or managed the waiting list for GIDS, the Children and Young People’s Gender Dysphoria Services.
• NHSE/I are now the data controllers for the AGEM Referral Hub. Should you wish to contact them directly to learn more about the referrals/waiting list that they hold, the relevant email address is contactus@nhs.net

C. We note your request that the data be provided in Excel format, however it has been provided as a csv file, in line with guidance issued by the Information Commissioner’s Office in order to mitigate risk to personal information. This Trust no longer provides data as excel spreadsheets/workbooks.

D. You will appreciate that this data involves low numbers, i.e. equal to or less than five. Were we to disclose the data requested it could potentially lead to identification or re-identification of the individual(s) concerned. Although the month and year alone are not personal data, we have also to consider whether other information that is already available, or may become available, to any member of the public, could be combined with the data requested so as to enable identification of the individual(s) concerned. We are, therefore, withholding this information under S.40(2) Personal Information and showing these low numbers as <5.

Section 40 is an absolute exemption under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, and does not require us to carry out the public interest test.

* GIDS Waiting List Annually, by Financial Year Quarters