Is your therapist registered?

It is important that the therapist that you are seeing for psychological help is registered with a professional body. This is because, unlike terms such as ‘clinical psychologist’ or ‘psychiatrist’, common labels like ‘counsellor’, ‘therapist’ or ‘psychotherapist’ are not legally protected in the UK. This means that there are no minimum requirements regarding who is able to use these latter terms. If your therapist is registered with a professional body, this serves as a form of insurance. It ensures that they: have obtained a recognised professional training/qualification, are committed to keeping up to date with their practise, are supervised and are working to a code of ethical practice. This website [here] is under development as I write this, but it allows you to check that a therapist is registered with one of several professional organisations (although it does not include all of them).