Initially had a great experience - registered online and had an initial phone appointment within a week. The practitioner I spoke to was lovely and made me feel comfortable. It was all downhill from there - I was supposed to start a group online session the following week, but I was never sent the online meeting link. I kept waiting for it and assumed it may arrive 30 mins or so before the session but it never came. I was then told I was kicked off the course for not attending the first session (!) I rang up and said fine I will just go on a waiting list for 1-1 therapy if that’s the attitude with which the online courses are ran. Bear in mind this is a course that is meant to help with anxiety and only made me feel worse. So I then waited around a month for 1-1 therapy, received a text on a Sunday afternoon to say I have my first appointment on Tuesday, at 11am, and the name of my therapist. Okay. Where am I supposed to go exactly? So then I have to ring up, again. Again, this is meant to be helping with my anxiety… luckily the work I have done in the past means I can handle phone calls when I know what to say (in this instance “where is my therapy session meant to be…”) but it’s very common for people struggling with anxiety (I.e the people accessing this service) to struggle with phone calls. So constantly failing to provide communication and information is not okay. When I rang up today to confirm the location of my appointment they didn’t seem to give a toss that they didn’t do their job properly, then told me it’s on the other side of the city to where I live and work. So now I have 24hours to figure out how I’m going to get there, during a work day! Simply none of how this system works is built with anxious and depressed people in mind, it’s only making things more difficult. I appreciate the short wait times but what good are they when the service is so difficult to access? I just hope my therapist tomorrow is actually useful to make all this worth it.
"The admin needs work. "
Posted via nhs.uk
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