- You care for others. You deserve care too.
Psychiatric Care for Healthcare Workers in Australia
Doctors, nurses, midwives, paramedics and allied health professionals work under pressures most people never encounter. Chronic stress, cumulative trauma exposure, burnout, anxiety and depression are not signs of unsuitability for the work. They are what sustained exposure can produce in anyone.
PsycheTel Australia provides confidential psychiatric assessment and treatment for healthcare workers across Australia, by secure telehealth.
Confidentiality and mandatory notification
You already know that mandatory notification provisions exist under the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law, which is why you have read this far before booking. So here is the position, rather than a reassurance.
The threshold that applies when your doctor is treating you
There are four grounds for mandatory notification: impairment, intoxication while practising, significant departure from accepted professional standards, and sexual misconduct.
For the first three, a treating practitioner is required to notify only where they form a reasonable belief that their practitioner-patient is placing the public at substantial risk of harm. AHPRA describes this as a very high threshold. A lower threshold applies to sexual misconduct.
The threshold was deliberately raised so that health practitioners would seek care without fear of being reported for doing so.
What does not trigger a notification
Seeking help is not notifiable conduct. Neither is receiving a diagnosis, taking medication, or taking time off to get well.
AHPRA’s own guidance states that a practitioner who is managing a physical or mental health issue by seeking help, or who takes time off to get well, is highly unlikely to pose a substantial risk of harm.
Being unwell and getting treatment is the opposite of the situation the provisions are written for.
Where you practise matters
In Western Australia, treating practitioners are exempt from making mandatory notifications.
In Queensland, notifications are made to the Office of the Health Ombudsman rather than directly to AHPRA.
If you practise in either state, raise it at the start of your first consultation.
What happens to your information
- Your employer is not contacted without your consent.
- A report is provided to your referring doctor as part of coordinated care. If you would prefer correspondence to go to a different GP, or to discuss limiting it, raise this before your first appointment.
- Clinical records are managed in line with the Privacy Act 1988 and Australian Privacy Principles.
- Your consultation is not reported to your college, your employer, or your registration board as a matter of course.
Who we see
PsycheTel Australia provides psychiatric care for:
- Medical practitioners, including GPs, surgeons, specialists and junior doctors
- Nurses and midwives
- Paramedics and emergency service personnel
- Allied health professionals
- Aged care workers
- Healthcare executives and managers
- Medical students and trainees
We also see police, firefighters and defence personnel. The occupational pressures overlap, though the regulatory position differs. See our PTSD page for trauma-specific information.
What we assess and treat
Within our clinicians’ scope of practice, common reasons healthcare workers are referred include:
Each of these is assessed individually. Being a healthcare worker does not make any particular condition more or less likely in your case.
- Burnout and occupational exhaustion
- Anxiety, including performance and procedural anxiety
- Depression and low mood
- PTSD and cumulative trauma exposure
- Sleep disturbance related to shift work and on-call rosters
- Distress following an adverse patient outcome, complaint or investigation
- Alcohol or substance use as a coping response
- Adult ADHD, which is frequently identified later in clinicians who have compensated successfully for years
Conditions we assess and treat in adults
Each condition below has its own page explaining what assessment involves and what happens afterwards.
PTSD
Adult ADHD assessment, diagnostic clarification and ongoing management, including for adults who have compensated successfully for years.
Anxiety
Assessment and treatment planning for persistent anxiety, panic and related presentations, particularly where GP and psychological support has not been enough.
Depression
Assessment, diagnostic clarification and treatment planning, including where previous treatment has not achieved what you hoped.
ADHD
Adult ADHD assessment, diagnostic clarification and ongoing management, including for adults who have compensated successfully for years.
What a psychiatric assessment involves
An initial consultation runs 45 minutes or longer. Your psychiatrist will explore your current symptoms and history, your occupational circumstances including roster, workload and trauma exposure, sleep, physical health, substances, relationships and family circumstances, and your professional goals.
Following assessment, treatment planning may include referral for psychological therapy, medication where clinically appropriate, strategies for sleep and shift work, and a schedule for review. Treatment options vary depending on the individual’s circumstances, and suitability is assessed individually.
We are aware that “take some time off” is not always available advice, and that a plan you cannot follow is not a plan. Practicality is part of the clinical conversation.
Why telehealth works
for shift workers
Consultations are delivered by secure video anywhere in Australia (metropolitan, regional and remote), including Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide, Hobart, Canberra and Darwin.
For clinicians, the practical advantages are specific: no risk of being seen in a waiting room, no travel on a rest day, and appointments that can be taken from home between shifts.
If you work in a regional hospital where the local mental health workforce is your own colleagues, telehealth resolves that directly.
Telehealth is not appropriate for crisis or emergency care.
Our consultant
psychiatrists
Associate Professor Andrew Leggett, MBBS, MPhil, PhD, FRANZCP.
Practice areas include mental health care for executives, first responders and health professionals; PTSD and post-traumatic conditions; veterans’ mental health; and psychodynamic and psychoanalytic psychotherapy. He also provides professional supervision for psychiatry registrars, early career psychiatrists, psychologists and GPs.
All PsycheTel Australia psychiatrists are registered with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency and are Fellows of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists.
Consultations are available in English, Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi, Tamil, Mandarin, Arabic and other languages on request.
Referrals, fees and Medicare
A valid GP referral is required to claim a Medicare rebate for a psychiatrist consultation.
If you would prefer not to be referred by a GP who is also a colleague, our team can discuss the options on 1300 652 935. It is a common request and not an awkward one.
Consultation fees and the Medicare rebate applying to each consultation type are published in full on our fees page.
Frequently Asked Question
Will seeing a psychiatrist be reported to AHPRA?
Seeking help, receiving a diagnosis, or taking treatment are not of themselves notifiable matters. Where a psychiatrist is treating you, notification for impairment, intoxication while practising or significant departure from professional standards is required only if they form a reasonable belief that you are placing the public at substantial risk of harm, which AHPRA describes as a very high threshold. A lower threshold applies to sexual misconduct. In Western Australia, treating practitioners are exempt from making mandatory notifications.
Will my employer be told?
No. Your employer is not contacted without your consent. Clinical records are managed in line with the Privacy Act 1988.
Is burnout a psychiatric diagnosis?
Burnout is recognised by the World Health Organization as an occupational phenomenon rather than a medical condition. It frequently coexists with depression, anxiety or sleep disorders, which are diagnosable and treatable. Part of the assessment’s purpose is distinguishing between them.
Do you see nurses and allied health, or only doctors?
Nurses, midwives, paramedics, allied health professionals, aged care workers and healthcare executives are all seen, alongside medical practitioners.
Will a psychiatrist who has not done my job understand it?
Our clinicians include practitioners whose stated practice areas are mental health care for health professionals and first responders, including provision of professional supervision to registrars, psychologists and GPs.
What if I am worried about my registration or a current investigation?
Raise it at the start of your first consultation. It is a common reason for referral and your psychiatrist will address it directly rather than deferring it.
If you are in immediate danger, call 000. For 24 hour crisis support, contact Lifeline on 13 11 14. PsycheTel Australia is not a crisis service and does not provide emergency or after-hours care.Group therapy items and family/carer items are also available under Better Access where clinically appropriate. Ask during your consultation
Book a confidential consultation
Secure telehealth consultations with AHPRA-registered consultant psychiatrists, available Australia-wide.
