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Bath and North East Somerset
Phone lines are open: Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm excluding public holidays. Please leave a voicemail during busy periods.
There is some limited availability for evening therapy appointments.
NHS BaNES Talking Therapies aims to help people access support for a range of common mental health problems. BaNES Talking Therapies provides a service for people who are 16+ and registered with a GP in Bath and North East Somerset.
Talking Therapies offers one-to-one therapy and online or in-person courses in accordance with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines for common mental health problems.
Talking Therapies do not provide urgent care. If you need help right now call NHS 111.
For someone to talk to, you can also contact The Samaritans for free on 116 123. The Samaritans offers 24-hour telephone emotional support and befriending in complete confidence.
How we can help
Many people can struggle to manage their emotions or feelings and need support to find helpful ways to cope. Our services can help you manage a range of common problems, including:
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low mood
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depression, including post-natal depression (PND)
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anxiety
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stress
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obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
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phobias
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post-traumatic stress (PTSD)
We use evidence-based therapies, like cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). Evidence-based means there is proof that the therapies are likely to make you feel better. We can assess what might be affecting you, however we are unable to offer specialist mental health treatment, medication or final diagnosis. You can find helpful information for other conditions via the main search area of the AWP homepage
The three main types of support we offer are:
- self-help resources, for example information leaflets, relaxing audio media, and access to the SilverCloud website to help with difficulties such as stress, low mood, anxiety and some long-term physical health conditions. This is an online CBT programme with secure access from a computer, tablet or mobile phone with a login. You can find a range of useful media and links in our self-help resources section below.
- courses which you can attend online.
- one-to-one appointments, assessments and therapy sessions.
Who we offer services to
Our services are for anyone 16+ with common mental health difficulties such as anxiety and depression also including; pregnant people, veterans, students, people with employment and money worries and people with long-term physical health conditions.
How to access our service
You need to refer yourself to our services, though in some cases a professional might refer you if you have a long-term physical health condition, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or diabetes, which is affecting your mental wellbeing.
For more information on how to make a referral, visit our referrals section below.
Before your appointment
During your appointment with the BaNES Talking Therapies service, you will be asked to complete some standard questionnaires. The questionnaires ask you to rate how often you have experienced common symptoms of depression and anxiety over the past two weeks. There are also some additional questions about areas of your life that are affected by any symptoms such as work, hobbies or relationships.
We email these to you approximately 24-48 hours before your session so that you can complete them online in advance of your session. You can find the questionnaire here.
To find out more about the information we collect and what we do to keep it safe and confidential, please see our details on ‘Privacy and confidentiality’ below, as well as the ‘How we use your information’ section on the home page.
Your first appointment
An assessment appointment with BaNES Talking Therapies will last up to 45 minutes and is usually over the telephone. However if accessing an assessment via telephone is difficult for you, we will work with you to find a suitable alternative such as a video or face-to-face appointment.
During the assessment, the practitioner will share with you some information about our service and there will be opportunity for you to discuss your reasons for accessing our service. You and the practitioner will then work together to discuss possible options and make a plan based on your discussion.
If you have not completed them beforehand, you will also be asked to complete some questionnaires in the session (see above). It is essential that these are completed for each attended session as they help us understand your difficulties, as well as consider the best treatment or advice for you.
If you have any more one-to-one appointments in future, you will be asked to complete a questionnaire each time to see how your thoughts and feelings have changed, and if any therapies we have suggested are working for you.
If you need further help, please call us on 01225 675150.
What can I do to prepare?
During your appointment, the practitioner will ask you some questions about your difficulties before discussing the best ways to support you. We want to help answer any questions or concerns you might have, so it is always helpful to make a list of these before you come along. It will also help you to think about what you want to achieve through using our services.
What happens next?
There are different options depending on what your main difficulties or goals are, and what is discussed in your session. Some of the options that might be considered include:
- A referral for an evidence-based treatment within the talking therapies service (this might include a course, one-to-one-treatment, or computer-based treatments).
- Using evidence-based self-help resources.
- If our services are not the best way to support you, we will make some suggestions about where to find the right support and advice, which might include signposting to another service.
- In some cases, we may refer you to another team for more intensive support to help you through your difficulties.
If it is agreed that one-to-one therapy or online guided self-help can support you with your problem and goals, you will be added to our waiting list. We are unable to give the exact time you will wait for your treatment to start. The practitioner can estimate how long our current waiting list is, however this is subject to change.
During your wait, the practitioner may give your some information to read, self-help material to work through or some links to other resources. Using these can be a helpful way to kick-start your therapy and begin working on some of your goals.
Should you feel that your symptoms are worsening whilst you wait, we would encourage you to discuss this with your GP and refer to our ‘Keeping Safe’ leaflet for additional helplines and advice.
How to book an appointment
Please call us on 01225 675150 Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm. We have clinics and appointments at various times from Monday to Friday.
Other information about appointments
- If you need to cancel an appointment, please do this at least 48 hours before your appointment date so we can offer the appointment time to someone else on our waiting list.
- If you miss a first appointment without informing us beforehand, you will have to book a new first appointment before you can access the service again.
- If you do not attend your first appointment without telling us beforehand, we will close your case. If you are in treatment and miss more than two appointments in a row then we will close your case so we can offer support to someone else on our waiting list.
- We follow the UK government’s ‘zero tolerance’ policy on protecting NHS staff from violence in whatever form it takesThis policy makes it clear that our professional team have the right to care for people without being attacked, abused or harassed by anyone. In line with this policy, we will report any incidents to our management or the police.
Privacy, confidentiality and information sharing:
To support the wellbeing of people who access Talking Therapies, it is important that we share some information with others who may be involved in your care and wellbeing.
- Talking Therapies will inform your GP that you are receiving support from our service.
- We will update your GP with your attendance and a brief summary of the outcome of your assessment or therapies with us.
- Occasionally, we may also liaise with other mental health services or agencies such as our safeguarding team to ensure you and others around you are safe and supported.
- Like any medical appointment, we will keep records of your attendance and include a summary of your progress. We will also look at the details in your completed pre-session questionnaire.
At the start of your assessment, the practitioner will advise you of our confidentiality statement and you are welcome to ask any questions about this.
Talking Therapies does not routinely share information with third parties such as family members, workplaces or other agencies unless we have your consent to do so. An exemption to this is young people under the age of 18, where we may need to share some information with a parent or guardian should we feel additional support around your safety and wellbeing is necessary. For more information, click here.
Our group courses and workshops take place online using video meeting software called Microsoft Teams.
If you are interested in attending a course, please book an appointment for an initial assessment with our service by calling 01225 675150, or by completing the self referral form on this site. Following an initial assessment we can refer you to an appropriate course.
To attend our online courses, you need a device with internet access. This can be a laptop, mobile phone or tablet with an internet browser so you can use Microsoft Teams. We will email you an invite with a link to join the session and will include details of how to use Microsoft Teams.
How we run our courses
We run a wide range of free courses and workshops to support people with different psychological and emotional difficulties.
To make them as accessible as possible, our courses run in the day or evening. They are usually short courses which can be up to 8 weeks in length.
We value everyone’s need to feel as comfortable and welcome as possible, so we encourage you to take part in discussions and ask questions only if you want to. There is no expectation to do anything or speak on your own if you feel uncomfortable to do so.
How to book a course
Our current courses and workshops are listed at the bottom of this page and are available for people registered with a GP in Bath and North East Somerset. We recommend that you only book one course at a time to make the most of the content.
The same courses run regularly, so our list includes some that are not running right now but will become available again soon.
For more information or to book a course, please contact our team on 01225 675150 (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm).
Living with a long-term physical health condition can be challenging both physically and emotionally. The symptoms of health conditions can affect your day-to-day functioning and they often require active and demanding self-management, which can negatively impact your emotional wellbeing.
Within talking therapies, we offer a wide range of support for many different long-term health conditions, including:
- chronic pain
- fatigue
- diabetes (type 1 and type 2)
- respiratory conditions (e.g. asthma, COPD),
- cardiac disease
- long COVID
- irritable bowel syndrome
Talking therapies services offer a variety of treatment options based on an approach called cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), which seeks to change our thoughts and behaviours to improve our physical state and emotional feelings. CBT is an evidence-based treatment for long-term health conditions and is a recommended component of rehabilitation and treatment programmes by the NICE guidelines.
Our available treatment options are delivered in a variety of formats, including:
- online
- virtual
- guided self-help
- one-to-one appointments
- group-based workshops
To book a course or for more information, contact BaNES Talking Therapies on 01225 675150.