Mental health & wellbeing

Our dedicated Anxiety UK Infoline offers information on accessing therapy via ABS, plus some telephone-based breathing exercises (which is available whether you are receiving support from ABS or not). The telephone number is 0344 848 7921.

If you feel you’d like to talk to someone regularly about managing stress, anxiety or depression, we can refer you to Anxiety UK who will carry out a wellbeing assessment to determine what type of support would be best for you.

Depending on the outcome, we can then fund up to 8 sessions of one-to-one therapy including counselling, clinical hypnotherapy, acupuncture or Cognitive Behavioural Therapy – delivered by an Anxiety UK approved therapist.

As well as seeking therapeutic support through ABS, we recommend that you see your GP about how you are feeling, if you have not already done so. Your GP can monitor how you are over time and perhaps suggest other interventions if appropriate.

We have made the process as simple as possible as we know it’s not always easy to ask for help.

1. Contact our welfare team by phone, email or through our website.
2. One of our welfare team will respond within 2 working days to find out what support you would like and to check your eligibility – see our eligibility checker.
3. We will send a unique link to you via email, which will take you directly to Anxiety UK’s online self-referral form.
4. Within a few days of completion of the self-referral form, someone from Anxiety UK will contact you directly to arrange a Wellbeing Assessment, which will be carried out via telephone. If appropriate, they will make a recommendation for a course of therapy based on your needs. ABS will fund up to 8 sessions of therapy.
5. Within 2 weeks, you will be contacted by an accredited Anxiety UK therapist and begin your therapy. Sessions are typically held via telephone, but if you have accessibility needs, you can discuss alternative arrangements with them.Whatever you discuss with Anxiety UK is confidential to you and them, it is not shared with ABS.  We only receive a recommendation for the level of support to be provided.