Erin McGreehan (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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947. To ask the Minister for Health to outline how an individual can access care from primary care psychology staff in a primary care centre. [16986/25]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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Primary Care Psychology is a large provider of psychological services at primary care and community level in Ireland. The service grew out of hospital and community care models which are largely one-to-one assessment and intervention models. Today, it provides a range of services of varying intensity, encompassing education, prevention, early intervention, and a range of treatments.

The service also plays a key role in signposting and escalation to secondary and tertiary services, both in psychology and across other disciplines.

The aim of the HSE's Primary Care Psychology service is to promote the psychological wellbeing of both adults, and of children and their families. These services provide appropriate assessment and therapy to children, adolescents and their families who present with a broad range of emotional and behavioural problems.

A GP or other health and social care professional may suggest that a patient talks to a psychologist about their difficulties, and will then submit an adult referral to the HSE's Primary Care Psychology Service, or in the case of a child will submit a child or adolescent referral.

Primary Care Psychology also accepts self-referrals, as well as those from GPs, allied health professionals, and schools. If patients have been linked with mental health services in the past, they should firstly discuss their referral with them, or with their GP, to assess which service is best to meet their current needs.