It’s Good To Talk
Wednesday 10th October 2007 The government announced plans this week to spend more money on so called ‘talking therapies’ to help people in the UK cope with conditions such as depression, stress and anxiety.
The figures proposed by Health Secretary Alan Johnson suggest that by the year 2010 an additional £170m will be spent every year which should enable 900,000 more patients of all ages to seek professional help from a psychologist.
This decision comes after a study by the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence showed that talking therapies were as effective as drugs when dealing with mental health issues and that patient who require said treatments often wait too long sometimes as long as 18 months to be seen by a professional.
The new proposal aims to reduce this waiting time to around 2 weeks and is planning on recruiting an additional 3,600 therapists to meet this demand.