Psychological Services
The psychological impact of an acquired brain injury on individuals and families is often severe and wide ranging. Our psychological services provide assessment, individual counseling and psychotherapy, family therapy, relationship counselling, and support groups which are targeted at the needs of both individuals and families experiencing acquired brain injury.
Assessment
Psychological services provide a range of assessments for people who have been affected by acquired brain injury. Neuropsychological assessments give a comprehensive picture of how each individual's brain is functioning at that time and addresses areas such as memory, attention and problem solving. These results are important for planning each person's individualized rehabilitation program. The service also conducts psychological assessments, focusing on the emotional and psychological impact of an acquired brain injury. Family needs assessments are also available, where the focus is on the family dynamic and a number of family supports can be recommended based on this assessment.
Family Support
Headway provides a range of support services for family members and carers of people with an acquired brain injury. Individual counselling is available for family members to address areas such as grief and loss, adjustment to change, self-esteem, conflict and relationship issues that may arise as a result of ABI. In addition to this, Headway offers relationship counselling to help couples make sense of changing relationships, to facilitate communication, and to promoting positive adaptation after brain injury. Also available to Headway clients is family therapy and counselling which emphasises the importance of the involvement of family in recovery from acquired brain injury.
Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy, or psychological therapy, is offered with a view to promoting long-term adjustment to brain injury. It attempts to help the brain-injured individual form an integrated sense of identity, based in part on post-trauma elements of personality, as well as the person's personality before the trauma. Psychotherapy can also address more specific difficulties such as anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, post-concussion syndrome, anger or depression. Psychological services work from a number of psychotherapeutic frameworks including existential, humanistic, cognitive-behavioural and person-centered.
Group Support
Support Groups are available to both individuals with an acquired brain injury and their family members. The aim of these groups is to increase each person's awareness of their difficulties, assist them in managing these, and provide them with a forum where they can discuss their problems with others in a similar situation. Groups for brain-injured people focus on cognitive rehabilitation, memory, anger, fatigue and peer-support. In addition, a monthly peer-support group is run for carers and family members where people can discuss problems, ask questions or simply listen to others in similar situations.
We also offer training to professionals and other organisations and take part in research programmes to further our understanding of acquired brain injury.