Frequently Asked Questions

You can self-refer to our clinic through our website by filling in our contact us form. Following this we will be in contact with you to arrange therapy sessions.

You may be self-funding or seek therapy via your private health insurance policy.

As above, you can self-refer via our website by completing our contact us form.  Following this we will arrange an initial screening assessment to discuss how best to proceed.

At the initial assessment it is a brief screening appointment to determine if a full ASD diagnostic assessment is required.

We will gather a brief background history in relation to the client’s early development, social communication, interests, sensory needs as well as their strengths and current difficulties. We may also use a rating measure to determine whether a full diagnostic assessment is needed.

At North Star Practice we adhere to guidelines set out by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) to ensure our diagnostic assessments follow the gold standard. https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance

We use NICE recommended ASD assessment tools including the ADI-R for developmental history and ADOS-2 for observation. We will seek further information/observation from a family member or close friend.

One-to-one therapy sessions are typically 45/50 minutes long.

Typically, individuals join a therapy session once a week.  With mental health difficulties some people might find that twice weekly, fortnightly or monthly sessions work better for them.

It is usually more productive to meet more often at the start of therapy and to increase the gaps between sessions as things start to feel better and more stable.

It varies the amount of time individuals come to therapy for and you and your psychologist will come to an agreement about this in the initial session. Some people come to work on a specific goal and this can be achieved in as little as six to ten sessions.

Other individuals come to therapy for a more longstanding problem and prefer to come for ongoing therapy. In this case, you and your psychologist will review the therapy regularly.

Some people find it helpful to write down the things they want to talk about, but there really is no need to do any formal preparation.

Being ready to talk about things that are difficult and being open to setting goals and about learning new skills and tools to help you form new, more helpful patterns.  We understand it is difficult to talk for the first time about mental health difficulties and everyone is different so we will try and find a way of doing things that feels OK for you.

A Clinical Psychologist is a psychological therapist who has completed both an undergraduate degree in psychology, often a masters degree in psychology as well as a doctorate in Clinical Psychology.  To be able to practice a Clinical Psychologist must be registered with the Health Care Professions Council (HCPC), and adhere to their guidance around ethics, professional safe practice and continuous professional development. Also bound to regulations set by the British Psychological Society (BPS).  “Clinical Psychologist” is a protected title and can be only used by those who meet the academic criteria, receive regular clinical supervision and are maintaining the criteria for registration. 

Clinical Psychologists are highly trained in a number of different psychological approaches and are able to integrate these methods to provide individually tailored therapy to meet a clients’ needs.