THOSE suffering with anxiety brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic could receive online therapy sessions after the Scottish Government announced an extra £3.8m for mental health services.
The additional money will expand the NHS's mental health hub and telephone services to run 24 hours a day - while digital cognitive behavioural therapy will be offered online, without the need for people to be the same room as psychologists, where appropriate.
Health Secretary Jeane Freeman said: "The £3.8m does two things. It does allow us to scale up the mental health hub to 24-hour cover. We will also benefit from the involvement of clinical psychology students.
"That will allow us to increase both the telephone and webchat breathing space offer."
She added: "We will offer an increased service through digital cognitive therapy.
READ MORE: Coronavirus in Scotland: Death toll rises to 33 as 65,000 likely to have Covid-19
"It allows some of that treatment to be delivered digitally."
Fuding of £2.1 million will provide 27 full time equivalent psychological wellbeing practitioners, five mental health nurse practitioners and two senior charge nurses - all to provide 24-hour cover for the NHS mental health hub.
The hub is currently only available out of hours during the week and over the weekend.
Minister for Mental Health Clare Haughey added: “Dedicated mental health professionals provide high quality care across Scotland – but in these trying times they are needed more than ever.
READ MORE: Coronavirus in Scotland: Coping with anxiety during the pandemic
“The current situation around COVID-19, including concerns around social distancing, is an understandable cause of anxiety for many people. NHS 24 has already begun to see an increase in calls, including to Breathing Space, in recent weeks and anticipate this will continue to grow.
“It is vital that during this period of uncertainty anyone who requires support for their mental health can receive it.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel