A follow-up study of the long-term effects of counselling in a primary care counselling psychology service

Abstract

Despite much recent work examining the short-term effect of counselling in primary healthcare settings, to date relatively little research has examined the effectiveness of such treatment programmes over the longer term. In this study, 58 participants underwent brief, time-limited integrative counselling sessions, with symptoms being measured using the CORE-OM immediately before, immediately after, and 30 months after counselling. It was found that in addition to participants reporting significantly lower levels of psychological distress immediately post-counselling, a further significant improvement at 30-month follow-up was also apparent, indicating that the benefit from counselling was maintained. In addition to this reduction in symptoms post-counselling, a significant reduction in GP visits was also detected in the 12 months following counselling when compared with the 12 months prior to counselling, indicating a lower reliance on the primary healthcare team after counselling.

Keywords:

• Brief integrative counselling
• CORE-OM
• long-term follow-up
• primary care
• counselling

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank all those who participated in the research, the counsellors and psychologists involved for all their hard work, all the GP and surgery staff, and the service users who made this study possible.