How to make a referral

Who can refer?

Currently, we accept referrals from GPs and health care professionals, as well as school staff or education professionals.

Referral criteria

Before you make a referral please check the following criteria:

• All those being referred must live (or attend school) in Blacon or Lache.
• We only accept referrals for families with ‘dependents’ (usually children and young people 18 or under) or young adults up to the age of 25.
• Our service is available to low income families/individuals experiencing mental health issues who cannot afford to pay for private counselling therapy.

Making a referral

Please download and complete the referral form . Please ensure before you make a referral to us that the family/individual has consented to this. Completed referral forms should be returned to info@platformforlife.org.uk

Once we receive the referral form, we’ll contact the prospective client/s by phone within 4 weeks. During this chat we offer additional information about the service, agree the best place to meet and also answer any questions they may have.

Demand for our service is very high and our aim is to meet clients for an assessment appointment within 2-4 weeks of contacting them. Once this assessment is completed therapeutic work will begin very quickly afterwards. Ongoing sessions will usually take place on a weekly basis and last around 50 minutes.

Our approach is based on healing rather than short term symptom reduction and we don’t restrict clients to a set number of sessions.  We recognise that they sometimes choose to withdraw either temporarily or permanently from therapy and we respect that. Any clients that we work with are free to re-engage with our service in the future should they need it.