This course offers an exciting and rewarding opportunity to develop your skills in evidence based low intensity cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) interventions for common mental health problems and to gain the accreditation you need to practice as a Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner (PWP).
The Postgraduate and Graduate Certificates in Psychological Therapies are fully accredited by the British Psychological Society (BPS) on behalf of the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) National Programme. It is the only accredited PWP training programme within the East Midlands. Outside of the region, it is nationally recognised for its high quality training provision and highly skilled teaching team in the field of Low Intensity CBT interventions.
The course provides you with a thorough grounding in the theory, evidence base and practice of low-intensity psychological therapy for anxiety and depression. You will develop your competence in psychological clinical assessment and low-intensity CBT interventions, including behavioural activation, exposure and habituation, panic management, cognitive restructuring, sleep management, problem solving and medication concordance. The course is heavily focused upon the development of clinical skills in the IAPT approved clinical methods.
"This is an excellent course, offering an outstanding level of proven outcomes in low-intensity CBT. It is pragmatic, popular and in my opinion exceptional value. The quality of the teaching and learning experience is second to none, and I am continually impressed with the standard of the results, year on year. The assessment methods are robust in achieving competence in the clinical methods. I am particularly impressed with the depth of knowledge and critical analysis students achieve. The course is nationally recognised for supporting both postgraduate students and those without a first degree in achieving the award, as well as meeting accreditation standards."
External examiner, Professor Chris Williams, Professor of Psychosocial Psychiatry, University of Glasgow
Entry requirements
The course has until recently only been open to people employed within IAPT services in trainee positions funded by the Strategic Health Authority as part of the IAPT initiative. We are now taking applications from those outside of the initiative. The course is available for applicants who hold a first degree to study at postgraduate level and for those who do not hold a first degree to study at graduate level, providing you can:
- demonstrate relevant experience within a mental health setting or voluntary work with patients with mental health difficulties
- have access to a high-volume caseload of patients with anxiety and / or depression within an IAPT, statutory, community, voluntary or charitable sector setting
- have access to supervision at the required level: a minimum of one hour per week for individual case management supervision, and a minimum of one hour per fortnight for clinical skills supervision for low-intensity CBT, clinical skills supervision can be either individual or group based (in groups no larger than 12 people). Supervisors must have attended training in Case Management and Clinical Skills on an IAPT Accredited University Based Course. We provide training for all supervisors
- that you and your employer can commit to free up your time to undertake the full 45 days of the course if taking the full programme (or the full 25 days if you are undertaking IAPT ‘Top-Up’ Training).
IAPT ‘Top-Up’ Training is open to those working within an IAPT service, who already hold a Core Profession of Mental Health Nursing (RMN) or those who have completed a Graduate Mental Health Worker (GMHW) programme, but require the additional training in evidence based low-intensity CBT interventions to meet the practitioner accreditation standards.
Please contact us to find out more.
A flyer for this course can be downloaded here.