Military Charity Tests Online Therapy Sessions

A veterans' mental health charity is trying to encourage more servicemen and women to seek help through online sessions.

Combat Stress has been working with the Forces In Mind Trust on a year-long pilot study to test what it calls 'Tele-Therapy'.

Dr Dominic Murphy, a lecturer in Clinical Psychology at Combat Stress, says the aim of the service is to make therapy more accessible and address some of the barriers that some people face:

"We've had some veterans tells us that actually they didn't want their employer to know they were seeking support."

Combat Stress say this form of interaction could be a way to treat the many mental health sufferers who cannot be reached by conventional means and to find out if the intimacy of the treatment room could be recreated online.

Dr Murphy said: "The main aim of the study was 'is it acceptable to veterans', but also 'is it acceptable to clinicians'."

The charity is optimistic that the affordable nature of this kind of treatment will help them reach more veterans in need, but they said traditional treatment remained the best course for those suffering from the most complex disorders.