Service Detail

Helix is a specialist therapeutic service for women and birthing people who live in Croydon, Lambeth, Lewisham or Southwark and who are experiencing emotional distress, or mental health difficulties following a perinatal loss.

Who is the service for?

We work with people who have experienced:

• Pregnancy loss (this may include loss associated with fertility treatment, miscarriage that has occurred at any stage, or terminations including termination of pregnancy for foetal anomaly)
• A stillbirth or death of a baby

The service is open to anyone who is currently experiencing emotional distress or mental health difficulties related to a perinatal loss, regardless of how long ago the loss happened. This may include pregnancy after loss.

We recommend that people are not referred within the first 4 weeks of a loss, to allow your body and mind time to recover and for us to intervene at the right time.

We are only able to offer a service to residents of Croydon, Lambeth, Lewisham and Southwark.

Please note: Currently, we are accepting referrals from Southwark, Lambeth, Lewisham and Croydon ONLY.

How the service works

The Helix service is made up of psychologists, psychological therapists, midwives and peer support workers. Our aim is to improve mental health and wellbeing for people and their family.

Support may include:

• Evidence-based psychological therapy, including Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing (EMDR)
• Peer support either within the service or in the community
• Liaising with other professionals who are providing care to the person
• Including partners and family members in care when this is helpful
• Suggesting services that partners or family members can access for individual therapy or other support

We can arrange an interpreter if this is needed.

We encourage people to bring a family member or friend along to the initial or future appointments if helpful.