From your description, I would suggest checking out PivotTables.
Here is one place to start.
http://peltiertech.com/Excel/Pivots/pivotstart.htm

--
tj


"Iain Halder" wrote:

Hi,

I hope someone can help me here ...

I have a list of names well over 2000 and growing listed in one
column. Adjacent to this column is a list of admission dates and also
a third column of discharge dates.


NAME ADMIT DATE DISCHARGE DATE
Joe Bloggs 22-Jan-05 27-Jan-05

I need to be able to get Excel to count this entire list of names but
identify each name and how often it appears and when.

I work with the NHS and my reason for asking this question is I need
to be able ...

* to identify frequent attenders to our services.
* to see how many people re-refer to our services within 28 days of
being discharged
* how many are also discharged within 28 days of admission and
* the duration of their stay.

I'm thinking SUMPRODUCT will do the job with some arithmetic related
to counting length of stay.

However where I am stuck is in the first part of being able to get the
computer to run through this initial list counting the names and how
often they appear. The approach I'm adopting at the moment is a manual
one of getting excel to sort the names alphabetically and physically
counting them and then checking the dates visually. This is not really
practical though, as you could imagine.

Hope someone here can be of help or refer me even to an online source
that can.

Thank you guys in advance.

Iain Halder
Rescued Cats & Kittens Needing Homes
'o'< www.celiahammond.org 'o'<
'o'< www.cat77.org.uk 'o'<