In short, no.
Hypnotherapy is not available on the NHS.
However, this situation may not be forever.
Hypnotherapy is not available on the NHS because understandably, they want to ensure in so far as it is feasibly possible, the highest possible quality services to members of the public who, after all, pay for services provided by the NHS by taxes.
Unlike other services provided by the NHS, hypnotherapy is seen as a complimentary therapy and is not regulated by one overall body. The opposite of courses true of doctors and nurses, who for example, are regulated by the BMA and NMC respectively.
Hypnotherapy isn’t required to be regulated by law but that doesn’t mean to say that professionals who provide hypnotherapy services aren’t regulated – they are. It’s just that there are many voluntary regulatory bodies all of whom try to do the same thing – that is, to maintain and develop professional standards in hypnotherapy.
However, until there is more standardised regulation of hypnotherapy services, the NHS will not provide hypnotherapy and the complimentary therapies for that matter, on the NHS.
The first steps to an overall regulatory body? The Professional Standards Authority
Voluntary regulation with presently no overarching regulatory body, means, as good as these voluntary organisations might may be, that they all are slightly different with no uniform approach and policy towards standards, that the NHS is understandably nervous about.
The Professional Standards Authority is a statutory independent body set up in 2012 and, the good news is that they are presently consulting with stakeholders and interested parties (I shall be inputting into this) by 15 April 2024, including some of the main voluntary regulators in Hypnotherapy, which I strongly sense is a main indicator of new, strong intentional steps to more uniformly and effectively, regulate (I would like to say, profession, but in the absence of a statutory compulsory regulator, not yet) hypnotherapy, for ultimately, not only the protection of the public, but providing an excellent, high quality profession to the public.
Hypnotherapy on the NHS – past, present and the future
In summary:
- The growing popularity and use of hypnotherapy services, both an increase in the number of practitioners and clients seeking hypnotherapy, has grown immensely in recent years
- Consequently, there have been a proliferation of hypnotherapists joining voluntary regulatory bodies – a welcome thing, but the vast amount of these bodies vary in membership numbers and the quality of the regulation they provide
- The Professional Standards Authority and their initiative for accredited registers and their consultation is a very welcome development and will go some way to standardise and have a common framework for the regulation of hypnotherapists
- Despite the very high standards of many hypnotherapists and in most cases, an obligation to join one of the (many) voluntary bodies before they can be fit to practice to members of the pubic, there is still one main sticking point regarding any prospect of it being publicly funded, and it’s this:
- Until there is one overarching regulatory body to ensure very high professional standards, hypnotherapy will not be available on the NHS