Armed Force Veterans are estimated to make up 5% of the UK population and suffer significantly higher prevalences of mental ill health. The commonest disorders noted in a British primary care study were depression at 18%, followed by alcohol misuse at 17%, anxiety 15%, and post-traumatic stress disorder 3%. Levels were higher in women and in those with combat experience (see Resources and Links for reference).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Following the closure of Veterans First Point Lothian, NHS Lothian has been developing a specialist Veterans Mental Health Service, aligned with the Scottish Government\u2019s Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing Pathway National Framework. It provides veteran-specific support alongside and within existing NHS pathways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The service does not directly accept self-referrals from veterans, or referrals from GPs: access is arranged through liaison with Adult Mental Health (AMH) services.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The service currently offers:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Veterans continue to access NHS mental health care through the usual routes. In most cases, the starting point is their GP, who can assess their needs and refer to the appropriate existing mental health service. Where a veteran is already receiving care from an NHS Lothian mental health service, their clinician can seek advice or additional veteran-specific input from our team. Professional enquiries can be sent to loth.veterans.enquiries@nhs.scot<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Non-Clinical Veterans\u2019 Support<\/u><\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Veterans can also access non-clinical peer support, including practical support, signposting and links with relevant statutory and third-sector organisations. They do not need to be referred to formal mental health services for this, though are often recommended such support when they are. The drop-in support hubs are widely advertised via third sector partners and across NHS Lothian clinicians working with veterans. A.F & C.M – 20-10-26<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not a new or separate referral pathway for GPs, who are not being asked to undertake additional assessment or decide whether specialist veterans input is required. Veterans should continue to be referred through the established mainstream adult mental health pathways, according to their needs and the existing RefHelp criteria. Urgent and crisis presentations should similarly follow the usual routes. Where GPs make such referrals, it would be helpful for the referrals to identify:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The veterans\u2019 mental health service is still developing. The current model is enhanced veteran-specific provision integrated with mainstream NHS care, rather than a like-for-like replacement for the former V1P service.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n The RCGP offers a Veterans\u2019 healthcare toolkit<\/a> and practices can gain accreditation as veteran friendly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Veterans Mental Health and Wellbeing Pathway National Framework<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Prevalence of common mental health disorders in military veterans: using primary healthcare data<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Patient resources<\/strong>:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n Edinburgh and Lothians Veteran services guide-ELVIS<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dealing with mental health challenges | Mental wellbeing | SSAFA<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Learn about our veterans’ mental health therapy services | Help For Heroes<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Armed Force Veterans are estimated to make up 5% of the UK population and suffer significantly higher prevalences of mental ill health. The commonest disorders noted in a British primary care study were depression at 18%, followed by alcohol misuse at 17%, anxiety 15%, and post-traumatic stress disorder 3%. Levels were higher in women and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"parent":4125,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_searchwp_excluded":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1064],"class_list":["post-17849","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-https-apps-nhslothian-scot-refhelp-veterans-mental-health"],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"heatherlevy","author_link":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/author\/heatherlevy\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":" Veterans Mental Health<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"Armed Force Veterans are estimated to make up 5% of the UK population and suffer significantly higher prevalences of mental ill health. The commonest disorders noted in a British primary care study were depression at 18%, followed by alcohol misuse at 17%, anxiety 15%, and post-traumatic stress disorder 3%. Levels were higher in women and","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/17849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17849"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/17849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30542,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/17849\/revisions\/30542"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apps.nhslothian.scot\/refhelp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
PLEASE SEE RESOURCES AND LINKS FOR FURTHER DETAILS<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/ul>\n
\n