The survey, commissioned by the Health and Social Care Information Centre, is a “state of the nation dataset” used by healthcare professionals and academics. NatCen, which has run the survey for 20 years, will design, carry out, report on the survey and archive the data.

NatCen’s interviewers and nurses will visit around 8,000 adults and 2,000 children each year to collect self-reported and biometric data across a range of topics including disability, mental health and care needs and obesity.

“It’s a credit to NatCen’s interviewers and researchers’ hard work and skill that we’re coming up to almost a quarter of a century of delivering this vital survey,” said Rachel Craig, senior research director at NatCen Social Research. “I am incredibly pleased that we’ve secured another four years of the important and influential Health Survey for England.”