Photo: Marathon · CC BY-SA 2.0Across Birkenhead, life expectancy spans 13 years from one area to another
Inside the city, men’s life expectancy runs from 67.5 in Birkenhead Central to 80.8 in Noctorum South, 1.8 miles apart. Life expectancy is 75.4 for men and 80.0 for women. England as a whole stood at 79.1 and 83.0 over 2019 to 2023. Birkenhead grades D− for health: life expectancy, healthy life expectancy, early deaths, hospital admissions, child obesity and Census health, each adjusted for age; #23 of 25 in Merseyside.
What stands out about health in Birkenhead
A 13-year gap from one part of Birkenhead to another
Men in Noctorum South can expect to live to 80.8, longer than the English average of 79.1. In Birkenhead Central, 1.8 miles away, the figure is 67.5, and Birkenhead Central records 272 deaths under 75 for every 100 expected for its ages. For women the range is 74.9 in Birkenhead Central to 85.0 in Noctorum South. Neighbourhoods ↓
A&E waits run longer than England’s
Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the A&E at Arrowe Park Hospital, saw 46% of major-A&E patients within four hours in the 12 months to September 2026, against 61% across England: 114th of 117 trusts. 33% of patients admitted through its A&Es waited more than 12 hours from the decision to admit, against 13% in England. A&E ↓
More of Birkenhead’s children are obese
26% of Year 6 children (aged 10 to 11) were measured as obese over the last three school years, against 22.3% across England; more than in 92% of UK towns. Health Grade ↓
Patients rate Birkenhead’s GP practices above England’s
In the 2026 GP Patient Survey, 83% of patients at Birkenhead’s 15 practices called their overall experience good, against 77% across England, and 65% found it easy to get through by phone (57% in England). That is ahead of 67% of English towns. GP practices ↓
Written from the OHID, NHS England and GP Patient Survey figures on this page. Life expectancy covers 2019 to 2023; neighbourhoods are ONS middle-layer areas of about 8,000 people.
Birkenhead grades D− for health
Healthier than 3% of UK towns, on age-adjusted measures.
Behind the typical UK town on every measure. Even its strongest, child obesity and women’s life expectancy, are in the bottom 10% of UK towns; emergency admissions and deaths under 75 are furthest behind.
Each measure is ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more, the ranks are averaged, and the average is ranked again. Every measure allows for the town’s ages: life expectancy is worked out from the death rate at each age, so it doesn’t depend on how old the town’s residents are; deaths and admissions are counted against what England’s rates would give a town with these ages, and the Census answers against England and Wales’s rates by single year of age, so a seaside town of retired people isn’t marked down for being old.
Men’s life expectancy across Birkenhead runs from 67.5 to 80.8
Life expectancy at birth, 2019–23, in Birkenhead’s 14 middle-layer neighbourhoods (about 8,000 people each). Circles are sized by residents and show men’s life expectancy.
The gap follows deprivation closely: Birkenhead Central, where 65% of residents are income-deprived, has men’s life expectancy of 67.5. Birkenhead Central has the most deaths under 75 for its ages (272 per 100 expected), against 90 in Noctorum South.
Show every measure as a table
| Neighbourhood | Men | Women | Deaths under 75 | Emergency admissions | Year 6 obese | Income-deprived |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Noctorum South | 80.8 | 85.0 | 90 | 122 | 28% | 14% |
| Prenton | 80.5 | 82.9 | 91 | 107 | 20% | 15% |
| Upton West | 80.1 | 83.1 | 96 | 112 | 25% | 17% |
| Saughall Massie | 79.9 | 84.6 | 92 | 112 | 19% | 15% |
| Claughton North | 78.4 | 82.5 | 103 | 124 | 23% | 21% |
| Noctorum North & Upton East | 76.4 | 79.1 | 149 | 168 | 26% | 41% |
| Egerton Park | 76.1 | 81.5 | 128 | 148 | 28% | 30% |
| Oxton South | 76.1 | 81.9 | 132 | 132 | 24% | 31% |
| Claughton South & Oxton North | 76.1 | 81.2 | 125 | 139 | 18% | 21% |
| Woodchurch | 72.2 | 79.0 | 191 | 160 | 31% | 45% |
| Poulton | 72.1 | 76.8 | 200 | 174 | 33% | 48% |
| Bidston Hill | 71.2 | 76.5 | 218 | 183 | 30% | 64% |
| Tranmere | 69.8 | 76.1 | 243 | 190 | 30% | 53% |
| Birkenhead Central | 67.5 | 74.9 | 272 | 214 | 30% | 65% |
Deaths and admissions per 100 expected for each area’s ages (England = 100). Each figure has a range: Birkenhead Central’s men’s life expectancy is 67.5 with a 95% range of 65.3 to 69.7. Neighbourhoods are ONS middle-layer areas at least 30% inside Birkenhead; names are the House of Commons Library’s.
Wirral University Teaching Hospital saw 46% of major-A&E patients within four hours
Type 1 (major) A&E attendances seen, admitted or discharged within four hours of arrival, by month. NHS England publishes it by trust, not hospital: Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust runs the A&E at Arrowe Park Hospital, the nearest to Birkenhead (2 mi).
The share seen within four hours has held near 47% over 18 months. Long waits for a bed are commoner than at 90% of trusts: 8,846 patients in 12 months, 33% of emergency admissions through A&E. CQC’s latest ratings for Arrowe Park Hospital: urgent and emergency services requires improvement (2025), the hospital overall requires improvement (2025).
North West trusts
Hospitals within 25 miles
| Distance | Hospital | CQC overall | Urgent & emergency |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 mi | Arrowe Park Hospital A&E Wirral · Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust | Requires improvement2025 | Requires improvement2025 |
| 2.3 mi | Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Wallasey · Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust | Good2023 | — |
| 2.3 mi | Victoria Central Hospital Dental Service Wallasey · Wirral Community NHS Foundation Trust | Not rated | — |
| 3.6 mi | Clatterbridge Hospital Wirral · Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust | Requires improvement2020 | — |
| 4 mi | Liverpool Women's Hospital Liverpool · Liverpool Women's NHS Foundation Trust | Good2025 | — |
| 4 mi | Liverpool University Dental Hospital Liverpool · Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | Outstanding2019 | — |
| 4.1 mi | New Royal Liverpool University A&E Liverpool · Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | Not rated | Good2025 |
| 6.7 mi | Broadgreen Hospital Liverpool · Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust | Not rated | — |
NHS acute hospitals registered with the Care Quality Commission (care directory, 01 October 2026). “A&E” marks a major (type 1) emergency department, open 24 hours and led by consultants, in NHS England’s Emergency Care Data Set; a hospital without the mark may still have a minor injury unit or urgent treatment centre. Ratings run Outstanding, Good, Requires improvement, Inadequate; the year is when each was published. Distances are straight lines from the town centre.
83% of patients rate Birkenhead’s 15 GP practices good
GP Patient Survey 2026 (NHS England, run by Ipsos), about 100 patients a practice, against 77% across England. 6th of 62 English towns of 77,000 to 148,000, from the highest.
| Practice | Overall experience | Easy by phone | Wait about right | CQC |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Villa Medical Centre CH43 3DB · 5,159 adult patients | 97% good · range 94%–99% | 77% | 87% | Good2016 |
| Dr Ivan Camphor CH49 9DA · 4,356 adult patients | 93% good · range 89%–96% | 79% | 74% | Good2022 |
| Hamilton Medical Centre CH41 6HB · 2,567 adult patients | 91% good · range 88%–93% | 82% | 83% | Good2017 |
| Cavendish Medical Centre CH41 8DB · 4,562 adult patients | 91% good · range 83%–95% | 70% | 83% | Good2019 |
| Dr Sekhar Karyampudi CH41 3RH · 1,478 adult patients | 90% good · range 88%–91% | 90% | 89% | Good2024 |
| Prenton Medical Centre CH43 0TS · 3,266 adult patients | 89% good · range 84%–93% | 83% | 86% | Good2026 |
| Holmlands Medical Centre CH43 0TX · 3,574 adult patients | 89% good · range 83%–93% | 85% | 84% | Good2018 |
| Miriam Medical Centre CH41 8DB · 13,111 adult patients | 84% good · range 64%–94% | 62% | 87% | Good2016 |
| Drs Grey, Lodge & Mrs Draco CH42 2AG · 6,927 adult patients | 82% good · range 70%–90% | 72% | 75% | Good2018 |
| Upton Group Practice CH49 0TF · 6,466 adult patients | 81% good · range 72%–88% | 70% | 82% | Good2026 |
| Whetstone Lane Medical Centre - Katherine V Gregson CH41 2TF · 7,113 adult patients | 80% good · range 62%–91% | 66% | 78% | Good2016 |
| St Catherine's Health Centre CH42 0LQ · 12,511 adult patients | 80% good · range 61%–91% | 46% | 66% | Good2016 |
| Devaney Medical Centre CH43 5RE · 6,467 adult patients | 75% good · range 62%–85% | 42% | 59% | Good2016 |
| Gladstone Medical Centre - M Salahuddin CH42 3TD · 3,046 adult patients | 73% good · range 67%–79% | 65% | 64% | Good2019 |
| Drs Green, Majeed and Shetty CH41 3RH · 3,420 adult patients | 70% good · range 64%–76% | 54% | 66% | Good2021 |
The Villa Medical Centre has the city’s highest rating (97%). Miriam Medical Centre is by far the largest, with 13,111 adult patients. You can register with any practice whose area covers your address.
GP Patient Survey 2026: surveys sent January to March 2026; results weighted by NHS England. The range is the 95% confidence interval. Adult patients: the survey’s practice population aged 16 and over. A practice counts as in Birkenhead when its main surgery is inside the built-up area; branch surgeries are part of their main practice. CQC ratings © Care Quality Commission.
Men’s life expectancy in Birkenhead is about what its level of deprivation predicts
Across 1,996 English towns of 2,500 or more, men’s life expectancy tracks income deprivation closely (correlation −0.81). Each dot is a town.
37% of Birkenhead’s residents are income-deprived, more than in most English towns. For that level, the line predicts 75.9 years for men; Birkenhead’s is 75.4. For women it predicts 80.3, and Birkenhead’s 80.0 is close to it.
Income deprivation: share of residents in low-income households, English Indices of Deprivation 2025, averaged over each town’s neighbourhoods. A town above or below the line isn’t necessarily doing better or worse on care: students, prisons and hostels inside a boundary all shift the figures.
Care in and near Birkenhead
The nearest A&E, the practice patients rate highest, and where to go when it’s urgent but not an emergency. In an emergency, call 999.
81% of adults in the Cheshire and Merseyside area who tried got an NHS dental appointment
Adults who tried to get an NHS dental appointment for themselves in the last two years, and got one. GP Patient Survey 2026, by integrated care system (the NHS area that plans dentistry for Birkenhead).
Across England 82% of those who tried got an appointment. Of Cheshire and Merseyside patients who did, 74% rated the experience good (England 74%). NHS practices taking new patients are listed on the NHS website’s Find a dentist; for urgent dental pain, call NHS 111.
The survey asks GP patients about dentistry, so results are published for health areas, not towns or practices.
76% of residents say their health is good or very good
Census 2021, all residents, as answered (not adjusted for age).
Adjusted for age, 166 report bad health for every 100 expected, more than the national rate.
Show as a table
| Census 2021 | Birkenhead | Merseyside | England |
|---|---|---|---|
| Good or very good health | 76% | 78% | 82% |
| Fair health | 15% | 14% | 13% |
| Bad or very bad health | 8.7% | 7.7% | 5.2% |
| Disabled under the Equality Act | 25% | 22% | 17% |
| Day-to-day activities limited a lot | 13% | 11% | 7.4% |
Merseyside and England: all residents of their built-up areas (towns and cities), from the same Census 2021 output areas.
How Birkenhead compares with UK towns of 77,000 to 148,000
Ordered by Health Grade: the top three, the towns either side of Birkenhead, and others in Merseyside. Life expectancy for men / women; deaths under 75 per 100 expected.
| # | Town | People | Life expectancy | Deaths under 75 | Health |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Guildford Surrey | 77,870 | 81.4 / 85.5 | 78 | B+ |
| 2 | Kensington and Chelsea London | 143,348 | 81.5 / 86.2 | 72 | B+ |
| 3 | Bath Somerset | 94,080 | 80.2 / 84.5 | 84 | B |
| … | |||||
| 31 | Southport Merseyside | 94,438 | 78.3 / 82.3 | 114 | C− |
| … | |||||
| 51 | Wallasey Merseyside | 85,619 | 76.7 / 80.8 | 132 | D |
| … | |||||
| 60 | St Helens Merseyside | 107,684 | 76.1 / 80.1 | 145 | D− |
| … | |||||
| 63 | Derry City Derry City and Strabane | 85,279 | 76.6 / 80.2 | — | D− |
| 64 | Paisley Renfrewshire | 79,351 | 74.5 / 79.8 | — | D− |
| 65 | Birkenhead Merseyside | 109,854 | 75.4 / 80.0 | 158 | D− |
| 66 | Oldham Greater Manchester | 110,722 | 74.0 / 78.2 | 166 | D− |
Health letters rank against every UK town of 1,000 or more; the order here is context only. Welsh towns are graded on life expectancy, healthy life expectancy and the two Census measures: OHID’s early-death, admissions and child-obesity figures cover England.
Health in the places around Birkenhead
Life expectancy for men / women, and the nearest A&E. Tap a town for its health page.
Caldy, 4.9 miles away, has men’s life expectancy of 83.9, 8.5 years longer than Birkenhead’s.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- A&E figures are for the trust. NHS England publishes four-hour waits by trust, not hospital, so Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust’s figures cover every major A&E it runs. They count type 1 (major) departments; minor injury units and urgent treatment centres are left out, which is why they sit below the all-types figure NHS England headlines (75% for England).
- The GP survey is a survey. About 100 patients answer for each practice, so a practice’s figure has a range (shown in the table); small differences between practices aren’t meaningful. The town figure weights each practice by its adult patients, some of whom live outside Birkenhead.
- Adjusted for age. A ratio of 100 means as many deaths, admissions or reports of bad health as England’s rates (England and Wales’s for the Census) would give a town with these ages; 120 means a fifth more.
- Small areas, summed to the town. OHID publishes these figures for middle-layer areas of about 8,000 people; the town’s figure averages the areas it covers, weighted by how many of their residents live in it, so a village shares its area’s figure with the countryside around it.
- Different years. Life expectancy and deaths cover 2019 to 2023; emergency admissions 2016/17 to 2020/21 (the latest OHID publishes for small areas, including the pandemic dip); child obesity the three school years to 2024/25; A&E the 12 months to September 2026; the GP Patient Survey early 2026; CQC ratings were published on different dates, shown in each row.
- Distances are straight lines. Miles are measured from the town’s centre to each site; the road is longer. For an emergency, call 999; for urgent advice, call NHS 111.
Questions about health in Birkenhead
How healthy is Birkenhead?
Birkenhead earns a D− for health, healthier than 3% of UK towns on measures adjusted for age. Life expectancy is 75.4 for men and 80.0 for women (England 79.1 and 83.0), and there are 158 deaths under 75 for every 100 expected.
Which parts of Birkenhead have the highest life expectancy?
For men, Noctorum South (80.8), Prenton (80.5) and Upton West (80.1); the shortest is Birkenhead Central (67.5). For women, Noctorum South is highest (85.0) and Birkenhead Central lowest (74.9). OHID figures for 2019 to 2023, by neighbourhood of about 8,000 people.
How long are A&E waits at Arrowe Park Hospital?
NHS England publishes waits for the trust, Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. In the 12 months to September 2026 it saw 46% of major-A&E patients within four hours, against 61% across England; in September 2026 the figure was 43%. In an emergency call 999; for urgent advice call NHS 111.
Can I get an NHS dentist in Birkenhead?
In the 2026 GP Patient Survey, 81% of adults in the Cheshire and Merseyside area who tried to get an NHS dental appointment in the last two years got one, against 82% across England. Practices taking new NHS patients are listed on the NHS website’s Find a dentist service.
Which GP practice in Birkenhead do patients rate highest?
In the 2026 GP Patient Survey, The Villa Medical Centre (97% good overall), Dr Ivan Camphor (93% good overall) and Hamilton Medical Centre (91% good overall). Across all 15 Birkenhead practices, 83% of patients rate their practice good, against 77% in England.
What is the life expectancy in Birkenhead?
75.4 years for men and 80.0 for women, on OHID’s figures for 2019 to 2023. Men can expect 58.4 of those years and women 60.5 in good health.
CQC ratings © Care Quality Commission.
Sources: OHID Fingertips small-area indicators (life expectancy and deaths 2019–23, emergency admissions 2016/17–2020/21, NCMP 2022/23–2024/25); House of Commons Library MSOA names · ONS health state life expectancy for small areas (MSOAs), England and Wales, 2019 to 2023 (healthy life expectancy) · ONS Census 2021 general health and disability, adjusted for age · Care Quality Commission care directory and latest ratings, 01 October 2026 · NHS Organisation Data Service · GP Patient Survey 2026 (NHS England, run by Ipsos) · NHS England, A&E Attendances and Emergency Admissions (monthly, by trust) and Emergency Care Data Set activity by site, June–September 2026 (type 1 A&Es) · MHCLG English Indices of Deprivation 2025 · TownRatings grades: our own summary of the data, ranked against UK towns only. All under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.