What do these scores mean?

[Oopla]

Hi all x

I recently went to a screening appointment with primary mental health care service ideally looking for counselling for long term panic attacks and anxiety issues.

Have been sent a letter with these rating score scales but no idea what they are or mean?

W&SAS:17
PHQ9: 14
GAD7: 13

Does anyone know? I guess I'm wondering if its worth trying to continue pursuing counselling as felt like they did everything they could to put me off

Is counselling only provided on nhs to those at risk of self harm?

You can google cut off scores, if that would help (I'm not sure they do without knowing what they mean).

Counselling isn't limited in that way.

Thank you for your replies snowymouse & unfortunatelyanxious

Looking at the scores now on the link I can see what they mean I think I will go back to my GP. Cbt was really heavily pushed, I hear really good things about it but feel that I need to 'exorcise' rather than 'cope' if you get me. Coping will come after.

I really appreciate the invitation to your thread, will probably name change but will def come across.

Hello Oopla (and hi to snowymouse) and thanks to uf for the link and think we met briefly on the Andes thread.

CBT is usually readily available on the NHS and I think you are allowed 6 sessions. There can be waiting lists dependent on where you live. I'm not sure what you mean by "exorcise" (as in having something driven out of you?) as this is my understanding of the word. Sorry if I am misunderstanding you. CBT is about the "here and now" and doesn't delve into the past, and can be good for anxiety, and probably for panic attacks too. At least it's worth a try.

Phq is depression-over 9 is mild depression-17 would be mod-severe.
Gad7 is anxiety measure-over 7 is mild and going upwards.
Wsas-is just how much your current problems effect life-scale from 0-40

Don't worry too much about the scores-they are just a quick way of measuring things-not conclusive-pcmh services use them to assess change more than anything-so the hope would be that the scores would reduce if you began to feel better.

Hi
the PHQ score is out of 27 and suggests you may be experiencing a 'moderate' level of depression - fed up! GAD - out of 21, same again, feeling nervous and worrying, maybe irritable; W&SAS is a socre out of 40 and measures how much feeling like that gets in the way of you getting on with your life.

We would all score something on these questionnaires at most times, hopefully mild scores (5/27 for instance)

CBT is offered by the NHS and most private companies as it is the thing that has been proven to kick the depression or anxiety outa the way, and pretty quickly, which is good.

Counselling certainly has it's place also, but only if the depression is caused by something like complex grief (bereavement that doesn't improve over years) or something like sexual abuse - times when we need to talk and not actually learn a tool kit to help us.

Even then, counselling can then be followed up with CBT to enable learning strategies for improving our quality of life. If the NHS is putting more money into CBT these days, it is only because they know it gets people feeling better and more able to get on with what they want to get out of lfe.

Any help?