The Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) has published a report on new statistics regarding safeguarding adults in England for 2013-14.
This report provides the findings from the Safeguarding Adults Return (SAR) data collection for the period 1 April 2013 to 31 March 2014. This is a mandatory collection that records information about individuals for whom safeguarding referrals were opened during the reporting period (also referred to as adults at risk) and case details (also referred to as allegations) for safeguarding referrals that concluded during the reporting period. The purpose of the collection is to provide information that can help stakeholders to understand where abuse may occur and improve services for individuals affected by abuse.
This is the first year the SAR has been collected. The SAR was one of the outcomes of the Zero Based Review of adult social care data collections and it has replaced the Abuse of Vulnerable Adults (AVA) return. It covers the same subject area as the AVA return but is much smaller in size and there are no directly comparable data items. Alerts and action types are no longer collected and demographics are recorded based on counts of individuals rather than referrals. Time series analysis across the two returns is not possible.
The SAR data are recorded by adult safeguarding teams based in the 152 Councils with Adult Social Services Responsibilities (referred to as CASSRs or councils within this report) in England. At the end of the reporting year, these data are submitted to the HSCIC in an aggregate form through Omnibus, a secure online data collection system.
Key facts
Safeguarding referrals were opened for 104,050 individuals during the 2013-14 reporting year. 60%t of these individuals were female and 63 per cent were aged 65 or over. Just over half (51%) of the individuals had a physical disability, frailty or sensory impairment.
For referrals that concluded during the 2013-14 reporting year, there were 122,140 allegations about the type of risk. Of these, the most common type was neglect and acts of omission, which accounted for 30% of allegations, followed by physical abuse with 27%.
There were 99,190 allegations made about the location of risk in concluded referrals. The alleged abuse most frequently occurred in the home of the adult at risk (42% of allegations) or in a care home (36% of allegations).
The source of risk was most commonly someone known to the alleged victim but not in a social care capacity, accounting for 49% of allegations. Social care employees were the source of risk in 36% of allegations and for the remaining 15% the perpetrator was someone unknown to the alleged victim. These figures are based on a total of 99,190 allegations recorded for concluded referrals.
There were a total of 56 serious case reviews (SCRs) for concluded referrals. A serious case review takes place when an adult or adults have suffered serious harm. The 56 SCRs involved a total of 100 adults at risk, of which 46% suffered serious harm and died and 54% suffered serious harm but survived.
Click here to view the report. Click here to view Annex A to the report. Click here to view Annex B to the report. Click here to view Annex C to the report. Click here to view Annex D to the report. Click here to view Annex E to the report. Click here to view the pre-release access list. 
