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If You Contact NHS Talking Therapies Can You Tell If You Are Interacting With A Human Being?

A just published paper in The International Journal of Social Psychiatry, by Arundell et al (2024) reports the experience of 12 clients:

  1. A long wait was often the first thing participants reported when asked about challenges with accessing NHSTT treatment:

. . .there was a huge delay from the time the referral was done back in May till I got my first session in November. . .So the GP referred, and I didn’t hear back until November. [P.12]

Another challenge was the limited support offered whilst waiting to begin therapy. While people did reference offers of self-help information or group sessions, this was either seen as insufficient:

. . .if you’re struggling, there’s like these videos online. . . on their website or something, they were useless. . . it was too general. . . so the information I can find from anywhere. . .. [P.5]

The amount of time given per session was often seen as insufficient and as such, this posed a challenge for service users:
. . .only having like half an hour session. . .I think with the treatment that I had because it was half an hour, she had to follow a very rigid structure. . .And that just felt like it took up a lot of time [P.3]
 
It was often the case that service users felt they needed more sessions or that they had not managed to work through everything they had wanted to:
. . .I guess it’s not, you know, a longer process. . .it’s not a program that’s meant to continue along with you. So, I guess there’s very much like goals that you intend to complete throughout the- the end of the program, but you know, obviously mental health issues like, continue. [P.10]

Service users appreciated when they were given the option of longer or additional sessions

We were supposed to stop at six [sessions], but I wasn’t feeling very mentally well, so we extended to seven. . . [P.8]

Disquiet at forced revisiting of painful memories
Some of the most common challenges expressed by service users related to their own personal challenges of therapy, such as the fact that talking about their mental health problems was difficult in itself:
In terms of the help for me it’s been OK, the only thing I would say that could be negative is just that the actual program itself like there are some parts that become difficult because of the nature of what is being spoken about. . . I think it’s more like revisiting memories I didn’t really want to revisit. That was the hardest part of it. [P.4]
 
Arundell et al (2024) concluded ‘Service users should be made to feel comfortable and confident in requesting additional support where they feel it is needed so that this can be considered as part of their treatment package’. 
 
At each session two psychometric tests are administered, the results determine the nature of treatment. Arguably NHS Talking Therapies has become de facto an Artificial Intelligence operative but the Arundell et al (2024) paper also cited the comments of some clients about the warmth of some therapists. The clients were all female and from ethnic minorities but felt no cultural adaptations to their treatment had been  necessary. But no data is provided on outcome.

Dr Mike Scott