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NHS Digital figures show 21.5 percent rise in access to IAPT services for 2021-2022

NHS Digital figures show that the number of people accessing talking therapies for conditions such as anxiety and depression through the NHS has increased by 21.5 percent from 2020-2021 to 2021-2022.

The report, entitled ‘Psychological Therapies: Annual Report on the use of IAPT services, England 2021-22’ provides information on the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme, which is run by the NHS and offers therapies approved by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

The publication comes with an ‘IAPT Annual Interactive Dashboard’ displaying demographic and geographic breakdowns, waiting times for entering and finishing treatment and more. It can be viewed here.

The report describes how 1.24 million referrals accessed IAPT services in 2021-2022, compared to 1.02 million in 2020-2021. Courses offered include cognitive behavioural therapy, guided self help, eye movement desensitisation reprocessing, and interpersonal psycho therapy.

It also shows how the overall number of referrals was up 24.5 percent from 2020-2021 to 2021-2022, rising from 1.46 million to 1.81 million. The number of referrals completing a course of treatment increased by 4.6 percent, with 50.2 percent of referrals moving into recovery, down 1.2 percent from the previous year.

A ‘Therapy-Based Outcomes Interactive Dashboard’ is also available, sharing the outcomes for different courses of therapy and measuring therapy-based improvement, therapy-based recovery, and therapy-based deterioration. This dashboard can be viewed here.