South West Veterans' Mental Health Service

Our staff have a wealth of experience in mental health and are appropriately trained to provide an efficient and effective service to veterans and forces personnel coming up to discharge. The clinicians in our team all have experience of working in military settings as serving or civilian personnel and so have a particular understanding of the issues veterans face.

The service seeks to provide increased access and treatment to appropriate and timely mental health services for armed forces personnel approaching discharge and veterans with mental health difficulties. There are three elements to the service:

1. Transition
   Working with the Ministry of Defence to offer mental health support for those in transition, leaving the armed forces.
2. Intervention
   Service for veterans with complex presentation.
3. Liaison
   General service for veterans who do not have complex presentations, yet would benefit from NHS care, who will be referred into local mainstream NHS mental health services to receive treatment and support.

Access criteria

To access the service as a veteran, patients must:

• be a resident in England
• have served in the UK armed forces for a full day
• be registered with a GP practice in England or be willing to register with a GP
• be able to provide their military service number or another form of acceptable proof of eligibility.

To access the service as a member of the armed forces approaching discharge, patients must:

• be a resident in England
• have an identified or diagnosed mental health illness / disorder

AND

• have a discharge date from the MOD or be found to be unfit for continued military service by their medical board

OR

• have been identified by the Departments of Community Mental Health as requiring follow on psychiatric care on discharge from the MOD

OR

• have had their pre-release medical and been identified by their DMS GP as requiring mental health transition support

OR

• have had a pre-release medical before they self-refer.

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