A nine-year analysis across England found that everyday weather patterns were associated with changes in mental health-related healthcare use, providing evidence to help forecast service demand.
Study: The effect of weather on unscheduled healthcare utilisation for mental health conditions in England, 2014–2022. Image credit: fizkes/Shutterstock.com
A recent Frontiers in Psychiatry study examined whether daily weather patterns were associated with changes in the frequency of unscheduled mental health–related healthcare visits across England from 2014 to 2022.
Everyday weather may shape mental health demand
Mental health conditions, such as anxiety, depression, and psychosis, are major contributors to the global disease burden, impacting large segments of the population worldwide. Beyond reducing quality of life, these disorders impose escalating demands on healthcare systems, with economic costs projected to rise substantially. Identifying factors that drive fluctuations in mental health–related healthcare demand is therefore critical for effective public health planning and resource allocation.
Environmental and meteorological factors have long been thought to influence mental health and wellbeing, with many studies linking weather variables, particularly temperature, to a range of mental health outcomes. However, much of this research has focused on vulnerable groups, such as older adults, women, and adolescents, or on the effects of extreme weather events.
As a result, far less is known about how everyday changes in temperature, sunshine, and rainfall influence mental health and patterns of help-seeking across the wider population. Emerging evidence suggests that even routine, non-extreme weather may affect psychological distress, symptom severity, sleep, and mental health service use, but most previous studies have focused on specific clinical diagnoses or acute outcomes rather than broader healthcare utilization.
The evidence for sunshine and rainfall is particularly limited and inconsistent, making it difficult to predict how common weather patterns influence demand for mental health services. Addressing these gaps could help improve public health planning and the allocation of mental healthcare resources.
National surveillance tracks weather and mental health contacts
This study explored how daily weather conditions influence unscheduled mental health–related healthcare use across England, drawing on national syndromic surveillance data collected from 2014 to 2022. Advanced statistical models were employed to assess the short-term effects of temperature, sunshine, and rainfall, accounting for nonlinear, delayed, and regional patterns.
Anonymized, aggregated contact data from three national syndromic surveillance systems managed by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) formed the basis of the analysis. These data encompassed NHS 111, general practice out-of-hours (GP OOH) services, and emergency departments (EDs). Contacts were grouped by day and region using patient or provider postcode, with age group and sex recorded to enable stratified analyses.
Weather variables included daily minimum and maximum temperature and rainfall from HadUK-Grid (UK Gridded Climate Observations), and sunshine hours from Met Office MIDAS (Met Office Integrated Data Archive System).
Weather patterns revealed subtle shifts in healthcare demand
Across the nine-year study period, researchers analyzed more than 4.6 million mental health-related contacts recorded through NHS 111, emergency departments (EDs), and general practice out-of-hours (GP OOH) services. NHS 111 accounted for the greatest number of contacts, with most involving adults aged 15–44 years and slightly more occurring among females.
When the researchers examined the relationship between weather and healthcare use, temperature showed modest but non-linear associations. NHS 111 calls and ED attendances gradually increased as temperatures rose, peaking at around 18°C before leveling off or declining at higher temperatures, whereas GP OOH contacts showed little relationship with temperature. Comparing the lowest and highest estimated risks, mental health-related contacts varied by approximately 17% to 20%, indicating that although the effects were modest, they were measurable across the population.
Looking more closely at different groups, the overall temperature patterns remained broadly similar across ages for NHS 111 contacts. However, adults aged 64 and over showed a distinct U-shaped pattern in ED attendances, with higher healthcare use in both colder and warmer weather. The influence of temperature also varied by condition. Warmer weather was associated with more NHS 111 calls and ED attendances related to alcohol use and overdoses, alongside an increase in NHS 111 contacts for sleep disorders. In contrast, the researchers found little evidence that temperature affected self-harm or depression-related contacts, while colder weather was associated with fewer anxiety-related GP OOH and ED visits.
Unlike temperature, rainfall showed no consistent relationship with mental health-related healthcare use, regardless of age, sex, or condition. Sunshine, however, emerged as the most consistent weather factor across all three healthcare services. Days with fewer hours of sunshine were associated with increased mental health-related contacts, particularly when sunshine levels were at their lowest. Although sunshine did not show clear associations with most individual conditions, reduced sunshine was linked to more GP OOH and ED visits for anxiety and depression.
These patterns were largely consistent across demographic groups. The greatest increase in ED utilization associated with reduced sunshine occurred among adults aged 45–64 years, while analyses by sex showed little meaningful difference. The findings also remained stable when the researchers excluded the COVID-19 pandemic years, suggesting that the pandemic did not materially influence the overall results.
The researchers also assessed whether the findings differed across England's regions. Sunshine showed the most consistent associations across the country, whereas temperature varied modestly between regions and rainfall showed the greatest regional variability, particularly for emergency department data.
Routine weather could help forecast mental health demand
The current study demonstrates that mental health-related healthcare utilization is sensitive to weather patterns, with increases observed during periods of higher temperatures and reduced sunshine. In contrast, rainfall showed no consistent effect.
Importantly, the authors emphasize that the study measured healthcare-seeking behavior rather than confirmed psychiatric diagnoses. As a result, the findings do not indicate that weather changes the underlying incidence or prevalence of mental illness. Instead, they suggest that routine weather conditions may influence when people seek mental health support, offering insights that could help healthcare services anticipate fluctuations in demand.
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