Psychological Therapies in Primary Care (InPsyTe) HIT concludes after 10 years 

A Health Integration Team (HIT) dedicated to improving talking therapies in primary care has concluded its work after 10 years.   

Most common mental health problems, such as anxiety and depression, are managed in primary care. The Psychological Therapies in Primary Care (InPsyTe) HIT – made up of academics, NHS managers, psychologists and service users – launched in 2014 to improve uptake of, access to, and outcomes for these effective treatments. 

An early HIT project evaluated SilverCloud, a low intensity Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) programme delivered online as part of Bristol’s Talking Therapies service.  

Their analysis suggested that SilverCloud appeared to be clinically effective in reducing symptoms of depression, anxiety and impact on work. It also tended to be more cost-effective, using less than one third of the clinical time per patient comparing to face-to-face Low Intensity CBT. 

One of the HIT’s key aims was to make services more accessible to ethnically diverse communities. In 2021, it secured NHS Charities Together funding to recruit two outreach workers to extend this work.  

Collaborating with community hubs and community groups such as the Malcolm X Centre, Wellspring Centre, Easton Community Centre, and faith-based settings, the HIT set up focus groups and one-to-one interviews with people from South Asian, Black African and Caribbean, and Somali communities about accessing NHS Talking Therapies. Through these discussions the outreach workers found out about preconceptions, barriers, resistances and stigmas, answered questions, and listened to and fed back concerns to the wider project team. 

They also interviewed psychotherapists, both independent and from the region’s NHS Talking Therapies provider Vita Health Group, about their experiences and barriers when working with service users from ethnic minority communities. 

The results have been written into an evaluation report with recommendations for improvement and presented to the local NHS Talking Therapies service. 

Bristol Health Partners would like to thank Professor David Kessler at the University of Bristol, Rick Cooper at Vita Health Group and everyone who has been involved in the HIT, for their dedication to improving vital mental health treatment for thousands of people in the region. Our other mental health-focused Health Integration Teams continue to work closely with talking therapies services and build on the important work established by this team.