Respondents aged 16 and over were asked how many times in the previous 12 months on their own behalf, they had a consultation with, or visit to a GP (including surgery visits, home visits, and consultations by phone, videoconference or e-mail), a dentist or orthodontist, and a medical or surgical specialist. The response options were ‘none’, ‘1 – 2 times’, and ‘3 or more times per year’. Unless otherwise stated, all figures refer to people aged 16 and over.
The results show how consultation frequency varied by circumstances, including poverty and deprivation status, equivalised household income quintile, and medical card or GP visit card status, and also by sex and self-perceived general health status.
In 2025, over three quarters (78.0%) of people aged 16 years and over attended at least one GP consultation in the last 12 months, up from 72.5% in 2022. Healthcare card holders were more likely to have attended a GP than those without a card, with 88.4% of GP visit card holders and 87.0% of medical card holders reported having attended in the last 12 months, compared with 73.5% of those without a card.
Card holders also visited more often, with 57.3% of medical card holders and 45.7% of GP visit card holders attending three or more times in the last 12 months, compared with 27.2% of those without a card.
In 2025, almost half (48.1%) of people had not visited a dentist in the last 12 months, while nearly two thirds (65.1%) had not consulted a medical or surgical specialist. See figure 3.1 and table 3.1.
Analysing by poverty and deprivation status, people aged 16 or more in consistent poverty, at risk of poverty or experiencing enforced deprivation attended the GP more frequently than those not in poverty or deprivation.
Almost half of those in consistent poverty (48.7%) and of those experiencing enforced deprivation (49.6%) attended a GP three or more times in the last year. This compares with 35.8% of those not in consistent poverty and over 1 in three (34.1%) of those not in enforced deprivation. A similar gap applied to those at risk of poverty (42.1%, compared with 35.5% of those not at risk). See figure 3.2 and table 3.1.
Income quintiles divide the population into five equal groups based on net equivalised disposable income, from quintile 1 (lowest 20%) to quintile 5 (highest 20%). In the lowest two quintiles, two fifths of people attended a GP three or more times in the last 12 months (40.6% in quintile 1 and 40.7% in quintile 2). This fell steadily with each quintile to 36.9% in quintile 3, 32.6% in quintile 4 and 31.3% in quintile 5.
The gap has narrowed since 2022. Frequent GP visits in quintile 1 fell from 43.3% to 40.6% between 2022 and 2025, while they rose in every other quintile, including from 28.4% to 31.3% in quintile 5. See figure 3.3 and table 3.2.
Analysing by self-perceived health status, people with better self-perceived health visited the GP less often. Over three quarters of those with bad (85.9%) or very bad (78.3%) health attended the GP three or more times in the last 12 months. This compares to two in three (67.2%) of those with fair health, one in three (34.4%) of those with good health and one in five (19.2%) of those with very good health. On the other end of the scale, one third (33.2%) of those with very good health had no GP visits at all, compared with 1.5% of those with bad health. See figure 3.4 and table 3.3.
Almost half (48.1%) of people aged 16 years and over had not visited a dentist in the last 12 months. Those in consistent poverty (66.1%), at risk of poverty (64.5%) or experiencing enforced deprivation (62.9%) were all more likely to have had no dental visit, compared with 48.1% of all respondents. Among those who did attend a dental consultation in the past 12 months the picture was mixed, 11.4% of those experiencing enforced deprivation had three or more dental visits, higher than the 8.6% of those not in enforced deprivation. For those at risk of poverty, the figure was 5.8%, compared with 9.4% of those not at risk. See figure 3.5 and table 3.1.
In contrast to GP visits, dental visits rose with income. Almost two thirds (64.1%) of those in quintile 1 had no dental visit in the last 12 months, falling to approximately half (50.7%) in quintile 3 and less than one third (30.2%) in quintile 5. Frequent visits followed the same pattern: 5.7% of those in quintile 1 and 10.5% in quintile 3 visited a dentist three or more times, compared with 11.6% in quintile 5. See figure 3.6 and table 3.2.
Two thirds (65.1%) of people aged 16 years or more had no consultation with a medical or surgical specialist in the last 12 months. This proportion was broadly similar for those at risk of poverty (65.4%), experiencing enforced deprivation (61.1%) or in consistent poverty (61.3%). See figure 3.7 and table 3.1.
There is similarly little difference across the income distribution for those who had a specialist medical consultation in the last 12 months. Of those aged 16 or more, 65.1% had no specialist consultation in the last year, this compares to 66.7% of those in the first quintile, 66.6% in the second quintile, 63.0% in the third quintile, 66.6% in the fourth quintile and 62.7% in the top quintile. See figure 3.8 and table 3.2.
Those with worse self-perceived general health were more likely to report having attended a medical or surgical specialist more frequently when compared to those with better self-perceived health.
Of those aged 16 years and over, 56.4% of those with very bad general health attended a specialist consultation at least 3 times in the last year. This fell to 45.0% of those with bad health, 26.2% for those with fair health and 8.2% and 4.1% for those with good and very good health respectively.
Almost four in five (79.4%) of those with very good general health had no specialist consultations in the last year, compared to 27.7% of those with very bad health. See figure 3.9 and table 3.3.
Analysing people aged 16 years and over, the frequency of attending healthcare services by the respondent's sex, it is evident that female respondents have attended the three healthcare types more frequently than male respondents.
In 2025, 43.6% of females visited a GP on three or more occasions in the last 12 months, compared to 28.7% of males. Over half (53.2%) of males did not attend a dental appointment in the last 12 months, while females were less likely to not have visited a dentist, with 43.1% of females reported having not attended an appointment in the last 12 months. See figure 3.10 and table 3.4.
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