NHS Postcode Directory: UK Health Geography Linkage

May 2022 and May 2026 extracts of the NHS Postcode Directory (NHSPD) relate both current and terminated UK postcodes to health geographies. The directory is issued quarterly and contains intellectual property from Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey, and other official sources. Columns likely contain postcode identifiers and codes for various health administrative areas.

Use Cases

• Mapping patient addresses to NHS commissioning regions based on postcode.
• Analyzing service accessibility by linking postcodes to primary care trust areas.
• Historical analysis of health geography changes using terminated postcodes.
• Geospatial aggregation of health statistics using postcode-to-geography lookup.

Strengths

• Contains both current and terminated postcodes, supporting historical analysis.
• Links to multiple authoritative UK geography sources (Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey, ONS).
• Issued quarterly, suggesting regular updates.

Limitations

• Column names and exact row counts are not provided in the available metadata.
• Sources disagree on the extract date (May 2022 vs. May 2026) and file size (15 MB vs. 10 MB).
• License information is not explicitly stated.

Provenance

Source

Government Digital Service (UK)

Collection Method

Official quarterly compilation from Royal Mail, Ordnance Survey, and other national agencies.

Time Range

May 2022 to May 2026 (extract dates)

Freshness

Last updated metadata dates range from 2025-08-11 to 2026-06-03.

Geography

United Kingdom