Health Anxiety
What is Health Anxiety?
Health anxiety is a condition characterised by excessive worry around having or developing a serious illness or injury, despite little to no evidence to support the concern. People with health anxiety often become highly focused on bodily sensations, physical symptoms, or changes in their health, which can lead to anxiety, fear, and distress. Individuals may engage in reassurance seeking to confirm the absence of an illness or disease, whilst avoiding situations that they believe could increase their risk of developing an illness or injury.
It’s normal to be concerned about your health from time to time, actually this is quite useful as it prompts us to seek appropriate medical treatment. However, if you feel like you are constantly worried that something is wrong, or have intrusive thoughts about becoming ill or visit health care workers more frequently than needed, it might be time to seek support. Our psychologists offer a safe, non-judgemental space to allow you to discuss your concerns and find a way foreward. We offer counselling in Footscray and our psychologists service the Western suburbs of Melbourne. If you’re feeling, stuck, scared or overwhelmed, we’re here to help. Please contact us to learn about our psychologists in Footscray or to find out more.
Signs of Health Anxiety
Health anxiety can be hard to manage on your own, especially when it begins to consume your everyday life. With the right support, individuals can learn to manage their thoughts around health and physical symptoms, reduce reassurance seeking behaviours, and regain confidence in their health. You might be more prone to health anxiety if you are currently experiencing a period of increased stress, have recently experienced a death or someone close to you has been given a chronic illness diagnosis. You might also be more vulnerable to health anxiety if you have a history of anxiety or OCD. Health anxiety can be treated with a rang eof therapies. Some that might help include Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Dialectical Behavioural Therapy, Schema Therapy or Interpersonal Therapy.
Health anxiety can leave you feeling lost, overwhelmed as frightened, or maybe like no one is listening, The Centre For Clinical Intervention has a useful online workbook to help you work through health anxiety, which is based on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.
Symptoms include:
- Persistent worry about physical health or serious illness
- Frequently checking the body for signs of illness or abnormalities
- Interpreting normal bodily sensations as serious symptoms
- Repeatedly seeking reassurance from doctors, family, or online searches
- Difficulty feeling reassured after medical advice or test results
- Avoiding health-related information or, alternatively, becoming preoccupied with it
- Increased stress, fear, or panic related to health concerns
- Anxiety that interferes with work, relationships, sleep, or daily functioning
So, what can I do?
To worry about your health is a normal human experience. Health anxiety refers to the excessive concern that there may be a threat to your health which triggers your anxiety (fight/flight) response. Support is available to help you reconsider how your thoughts, feelings and behaviours are currently operating, and help you move toward a life free from excessive health concerns.
Our clinicians offer trauma-informed, evidence‑based support to help you navigate challenges and concerns regarding with your health. Please feel free to get in touch to have a chat to us about finding a psychologist in Melbourne who might be a good fit.
We have Medicare rebate psychologists available, and we offer telehealth psychologists, Workcover psychologists and TAC psychologists.
Psychology FAQs
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Please get in touch today to have a chat to our friendly team so we can match you with an appropriate psychologist. If you are an existing client, you can book online.