Attendance guidelines for patients

Welcome to the Kirklees Talking Therapies Service. We hope that you find our service helpful and supportive, and we look forward to working closely with you to help resolve any difficulties that you might be experiencing.

In order to maximise the benefit of therapy to you and assist others who are currently waiting to receive help, there are a number of conditions that that we would like to make you aware of. Research suggests that regular attendance, commitment and input from patients improves clinical outcomes. We are also aware that non-attendance and missed sessions cost the NHS an estimated £266m annually and result in people in need waiting longer to be seen.

The following guidelines have been devised to clarify the level of commitment required of patients undertaking therapy with our service and outline the circumstances that will lead to therapy being ended prematurely.

Please read the following guidelines carefully:

1. Treatment in the Talking Therapies service requires input and commitment from you. In order to maximise the benefits we would ask you to attend all your appointments.
2. If you cancel two appointments your treatment will be discontinued and no further sessions will be offered. Further access to the service will be through a new referral.
3. If you are unable to attend an appointment you need to inform your therapist as soon as possible. Appointments will not generally be replaced and, unless exceptional circumstances apply, the missed session will be deducted from the number of sessions that have been offered.
4. If you miss an appointment and we do not hear from you within 24 hours, we will assume you no longer require our service and we will discharge you back to the care of your GP.
5. Anticipated dates of absence should be discussed with your therapist at the start of treatment. If two or more sessions are likely to be missed, the start of treatment may be postponed or a planned break in treatment could be arranged.
6. Planned absences of the therapist will be discussed with you in advance and will not impact on the number of sessions offered. Every effort will be made to contact patients in the event that the therapist is ill or has an unplanned absence. Sessions cancelled in this way will be rescheduled and not affect the maximum number of sessions offered.