News

More people than ever receiving psychological therapies and recovering

More people than ever are receiving psychological therapies and April saw the highest recovery rates so far in the history of the programme, end of year data has shown.

The number of people referred for treatment from January to March (Quarter 4) increased to 367,689 by around 17,000 from 350,505 in Q3 (Quarter 3). The 15 per cent access target was exceeded hitting a new high of 16.8 per cent.

And the number of people recovering hit an average 48.2 per cent in Q4, up from 45.9 per cent in Q3. In April 21,117 people moved to recovery, meaning a recovery rate for people finishing a course of treatment of 49 per cent, and the highest recovery rate seen so far missing the standard by just one per cent.

Waiting times continue to surpass the standard that 75% of people should start treatment within six weeks: in April, 84.6% of people starting treatment were within 6 weeks of referral, and 97.1% within 18 weeks.

Currently NHS England’s commitment is that Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services should be: providing access to treatment for at least 15% of people with anxiety disorders and depression; at least 50% of people who complete treatment should recover and 75% of people should start treatment in 6 weeks of referral, and 95% in 18 weeks.

Dr Tim Kendall, NHS England’s National Clinical Director for mental health, said: “We’re really pleased that a growing number of people are getting access to psychological treatment and that they are doing so in a timely way. This is great news. While we know there are many challenges with providing speedy and appropriate care in this area we are working to improve care.

“Workforce is one of our biggest challenges but the recent Mental Health Implementation Plan has committed to training 4,500 extra therapists by 2021 and developing new integrated psychological therapies services alongside physical healthcare.”

The Mental Health Forward View and Implementation Plan commits that by 2020/21 there will be increased access to psychological therapies so at least 25 per cent, or 1.5 million people, with common mental health conditions will access services each year.

The majority of new services will be integrated with physical healthcare. As part of this expansion, 3,000 new mental health therapists will be co-located in primary care, as set out in the General Practice Forward View.

Investment over two years will support better integrating physical and mental health services and expand psychological therapies in up to a third of all CCGs through building ‘Integrated Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT)’ services – co-located in and integrated with physical health services – to improve health for people with mental and physical health problems or persistent and distressing unexplained medical symptoms.

£17.8 million of funding in 2016/17 and up to £54 million in 2017/18 will go directly to training new staff and delivering new ‘early implementer’ integrated services.

In parallel, we will maintain and develop quality in services including meeting the three existing access and recovery standards set out above, including continuing to support areas with low recovery rates to improve.

Doncaster’s Talking Shop is a best practice example of how regions are helping to provide high street access to therapy without stigma.

The ‘shop’ run by Rotherham, Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust allows members of the public to walk in off the street if they need help for problems such as depression, panic or phobias, or simply to access free information or advice.

Talking Shop opened in 2010 as a public information centre and the headquarters for the psychological therapies service in the town, which was one of the IAPT national demonstrator sites.

In its first year, 2006-7, the IAPT service received 3,995 referrals, with a self-referral rate of just 0.3 per cent. By 2014/15, referrals had soared to 10,250, with a self-referral rate of 23 per cent.

5 comments

  1. Pete Adams says:

    How is recovery defined in this context? Not returning for further help?

    • Kassander says:

      Exactly the point I made in my comment, Mr Adams.
      As you see, the anonymous respondent has thrown a load of sources at us, but not actually answered any of our questions.
      Maybe the originator of this ”press notice” has fled the country and is no longer available to supply the answers?
      Or they just can’t be bothered with adhering to the principle of Evidence based procedures, and the boring task of data collection and analysis.
      It’s only people’s Health and Wellbeing they’re dealing with.

  2. Kassander says:

    WHAT a dog’s dinner of an article this is, with unexplained abbreviations, acronyms and initializations scattered randomly amongst unsupported assertions.
    If one is active and in the know about such matters as are covered in this article, then it’s probably understandable. But if that’s the case – ‘you’ probably knew all this info. anyway.
    If one was an anxious prospective patient (customer at the shop) then this essay will be both confusing, and raise false hopes – a magnificent duo.
    What are the confusions and confusions?
    Tell me:
    ** Which year do these figures relate to;
    ** What are: Q3; Q4; IAPT ;
    ** How is ‘recovery’ defined;
    ** Where are the 1 and 5 year sustained recovery rate figures (Is it that on mental health issues, like the common cold, once you’re over it, that’s it, for that version, for life?)
    ———
    Read my full response in their Mental Health section (As above)

    • NHS England says:

      Hi Kassander

      Thank you for your feedback. There is more information available on the dataset this press notice relates to is available on the NHS Digital website. It is in relation to IAPT services only:

      The Executive Summary includes a Glossary of Terms to help explain terminology.

      To understand more about the wider IAPT programme please see the IAPT webpages.

      Kind Regards
      NHS England

      • Kassander says:

        Gee, an’ Hi to you Bub, alias anonymous respondent, for this utterly inadequate reply, tho’ I see that some updates have been made to the original text in line with my critique.
        Retrospective supply of sources for interested parties to DIY the research necessary to make sense of this ”press notice” seems to imply alternatives:
        ** This information wasn’t supplied with the original posting because you thought that nobody was going to read this sloppy piece of journalizm,
        or
        ** Why should you supply this information to P&P, it’s not really any of our business to know the whys and wherefores.

        Poor show, Ms/Mr Anonymous.
        And do please lay off the ‘Hi’ salutation, it brings the tone of these interchanges to the level of the ‘Red Tops’.