Staff can contact their respective talking wellness clinician direct.

Access free, on-site, mental health and wellbeing support from a dedicated clinical psychologist and a high intensity therapist from the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) service, working from the following sites: 

• Kent and Canterbury Hospital, Canterbury 
• Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital, Margate
• William Harvey Hospital, Ashford
• Medway Maritime Hospital, Gillingham
• Darent Valley Hospital, Dartford
• Maidstone Hospital
• Tunbridge Wells Hospital. 

These on-line mental health wellbeing check-ins are additional support to that already provided for staff via their own trusts and organisations.

Release the Pressure

Text KENT or MEDWAY to 85258 or phone 0800 107 0160 for free confidential support at any time.

Free expert advice from trained counsellors is available for every mental health concern. Visit Release the Pressure to find out more.

Listening Line

For all NHS staff. 7am to 11pm. Phone 0300 131 7000  

Samaritans

• Phone116 123
• Email Jo at Samaritans (will respond within 24 hours)
• Mail: Send a letter to Freepost SAMARITANS LETTER
• Find out more at the Samaritans website 

Bereavement and loss support 

7am to 11pm. Phone 0300 303 4434.

National resource 

The NHS Leadership Academy can help you manage your own health and wellbeing while looking after others. 

Alongside information about support available to you, the website includes short guides to help support you with skills and new ways to improve your experience of work. 

The guides were developed with experts and cover topics, such as personal resilience, support for line managers and how to run your own 10-minute Pause Space.

NHS South East Leadership Academy

While it’s normal to struggle at the moment, looking out for signs in yourself and others of more significant distress can help you or a colleague access support. 

NHS South East Leadership Academy has published tips, resources and signposting to help you find the right support for you and your teams, including advice for:

• understanding your needs
• working in high-risk areas
• working remotely and shielding
• staying well
• patients and carers
• bereavement and grief.

You can access these resources via the Academy’s Looking After Our People page.

Free access to selected apps for NHS staff

NHS staff have been given free access to a number of wellbeing apps to support our mental health and wellbeing.

From mindfulness and meditation sessions to help reduce stress and build resilience with Headstart to support to help you to improve your quality of sleep via Sleepio, you just need to use your nhs.net email to download them. 

You can find out more via NHS England’s Supporting Our NHS People wellbeing apps page.

Most people's Covid symptoms get better within four weeks, however, for some people, they can last beyond this time. 

Symptoms that continue past 12 weeks are known as post-Covid syndrome or long Covid. The most common symptoms of long Covid include:

• persistent cough
• fatigue 
• breathlessness 
• brain fog (loss of concentration or memory issues)
• muscle and joint pain
• loss of smell or taste
• low mood 
• anxiety 
• sleep difficulties. 

If you believe you’re experiencing symptoms of long Covid, speak to your GP and ask them to refer you to the Post-Covid Assessment Service (PCAS) for further support and signposting. 

Living with long Covid 
Because long Covid is a new condition there is little evidence regarding the most effective ways of treating the symptoms. 

Many people with long Covid report that, in addition to the challenge of dealing with their symptoms, they feel scared because there doesn’t seem to be a ‘cure’ and they are left wondering whether or not they will recover. 

People with long Covid have also reported feeling frustrated and unsupported at work because to their colleagues they appear to look fine, so are expected to perform according to their previous capacity.

Fortunately, there is now guidance available for managers to help them understand the impact of long Covid on a person’s long-term health and wellbeing.  

This enables the manager to better support any members of their team who have long Covid.

Those living with long Covid may also find themselves experiencing a sense of grief around the loss of their ability to function (physically and mentally) in the way they used to. 

If you are struggling with painful emotions related to having symptoms of long COVID, it may help to seek support in working through those feelings.

Having a chat with a talking wellness mental health practitioner is one of the ways you can do this. Please email the Talking Wellness team and complete the form if this is of interest. We will do the rest and be in touch. 

All NHS and social care staff across Kent and Medway can access the service though this portal. 

From here you will see you have options. 

You can refer directly into the service using Limbic, the automated chatbot that appears in the bottom right of your screen. 

Alternatively, you can continue to browse the site, sample the self-help materials and, if you feel you would like to find out a little more before making a decision, email the Talking Wellness Team

Supporting the work of our team, we have a talking wellness psychologist and an Improving Access to Psychological Services (IAPT) practitioner based at each of the following acute hospitals:

• Kent and Canterbury Hospital, Canterbury 
• Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital, Margate
• William Harvey Hospital, Ashford
• Medway Maritime Hospital, Gillingham
• Darent Valley Hospital, Dartford
• Maidstone Hospital
• Tunbridge Wells Hospital.

There is a separate referral route for this service, usually via the occupational health team or a line manager. However, people can self-refer into the service using the same email address should they wish to. 

All NHS and social care staff over the age of 18 years in Kent and Medway can ask for free, confidential mental health and wellbeing support, without the need to be seen by a GP first. 

Our talking wellness staff portal provides quick and easy access into the service using Limbic, the automated chatbot that pops up on this webpage.  

You can reach Limbic at any time, and from anywhere, simply by scanning the QR code.

Limbic asks a series of questions about you and how you’re feeling. Once those questions have been answered the information is automatically processed, and one of our trained clinicians will get in touch with you within five working days to set up an initial telephone conversation. 

That telephone call helps talking wellness to understand more about what you are experiencing at the time, and to explore together what support might help you most. 

A maximum of four telephone wellbeing check-ins are offered, and we may even signpost you to other services, like Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT), if we believe that would be helpful for you. 

There is also an option to refer straight into IAPT when making the initial contact with Limbic. Additionally, we have a talking wellness psychologist and an IAPT practitioner based in each of the county’s acute hospitals. 

There is a separate referral route for this service, usually via the occupational health team or a line manager, however, people can self-refer into this service should they wish to.  

Email the Talking Wellness team and complete the form. We will be in touch to invite you for an initial assessment to help decide if psychological intervention would be helpful, and if so what type of approach would be beneficial.  

The assessment, and any subsequent intervention, often takes place in person on the hospital sites but can also be organised virtually if preferred. 

Yes, you can, in fact talking wellness is particularly proud of its partnership with the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme.   

If you choose to access our service using Limbic, the automated chatbot that pops up in the bottom right of the screen when you visit the talking wellness portal, it will ask you a series of questions. 

The answers to those are sent to your local IAPT provider, identified using the postcode provided.  

If at any time you don’t feel it is the right service for you, or later on, while engaging with talking wellness, your needs change, you will have the option of completing your own referral or having someone complete it for you if that is your preference.  

Either way, it is easy to do this, using an electronic referral form we will send to you by email. 

IAPT assessments contact you via the telephone and discuss treatment options, this can include online self-help resources, online group work for anxiety or depression, or one-to-one Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. A treatment pathway is be based upon your individual needs. 

Although talking wellness has a relationship with IAPT that can shorten waiting times, there is still around a six-to-eight-week wait to access the IAPT service. This varies from service to service and depending on therapeutic intervention. 

We aim to stagger sessions to bridge this gap and allow continued support during this time. 

talking wellness is also able to support members of staff to access more specialised support services depending on needs such as alcohol use, debt management, domestic violence, relationship support and bereavement services. 

Yes, you can; talking wellness has an agreement in place that enables NHS and social care staff to be seen by other trusts in neighbouring counties.

Please contact us to find out more by emailing the Talking Wellness Team

There are many mental health support organisations ready and waiting to provide help should you need it. Here are the details for some of them:  

Release the Pressure
Text KENT or MEDWAY to 85258 or phone 0800 107 0160 for free confidential support at any time.

Free expert advice from trained counsellors is available for every mental health concern. Visit Release the Pressure to find out more.

Listening Line
For all NHS staff. Available 7am to 11pm. Phone 0300 131 7000  

Samaritans
Phone 116 123

Email Jo at Samaritans (will respond within 24 hours)

Mail – send a letter to Freepost SAMARITANS LETTER

Find out more on the Samaritans website

Bereavement and loss support 
Available 7am to 11pm.

Phone 0300 303 4434