1. Make an appointment with your GP  

The first step is to discuss your symptoms with your GP.   

If they agree that you may have ASD and that you need to be assessed, you have the legal right to choose an appropriate provider and can ask to be referred to Psychiatry UK under Right to Choose (RTC) legislation.   

The referral should be sent to us directly by your GP (you cannot self-refer under RTC).  

2. What to take to your appointment  

It can be helpful to take a covering letter addressed to your GP and a completed AQ10 form to help confirm whether your symptoms are consistent with a possible ASD diagnosis.   

1. Download and complete this AQ10 form  
2. Download and amend this letter – Fill in your details where indicated (this should include your email address and phone number) and address it to your GP. 

3. How will I know if Psychiatry UK has received my referral?  

It can take several weeks to process your referral. Once accepted, we will contact you via SMS and/or email with instructions to help you set up an account on our MedQare portal.  

When you are logged in, you will find a welcome note letting you know what will happen next.  

 If you have not heard from us within 6 weeks, please ask your GP surgery:  

• The date your GP sent your referral.  
• Whether your referral has been returned to your surgery as incomplete, or has not been accepted. 

If your referral has not been returned to your GP and you have not heard from us after 6 weeks, please contact our customer support team using our Virtual Assistant service. Our opening hours are Mon-Fri, 8am-6pm. 

1. What information should a referral contain?  

Before making a referral to Psychiatry UK, please check with your patient that an online service is suitable for their needs. 

A referral MUST contain the following 3 items, or it may be rejected:

1. A short covering letter stating that you (the GP) wish to refer this patient to Psychiatry UK for an ADHD assessment under NHS Right to Choose legislation.

Please give a brief explanation for referral. Your letter should be addressed to Psychiatry UK and must have your name (as the patient’s GP) at the bottom (not ANP or other).

Please also include the patient’s telephone number and email address as these are our primary methods of contact.

2. A brief medical summary of the patient. 

3. The patient’s completed AQ10 form.

2. Where to send the referral 

The referral (including attachments) should be sent to: p-uk.RTC-referrals@nhs.net  

Please note that this mailbox is FOR GP REFERRALS ONLY.
This mailbox is solely for clinical use. Patient queries will not receive a response. 

Existing patients, please reach out via your MedQare portal account. For further assistance, contact our support team through our live web chat service.  

Alternatively, postal referrals can be sent to:  

Psychiatry UK,
3b Fore Street,
Camelford,
Cornwall,
PL32 9PG. 

We continue to experience unprecedented demand for referrals for both our Adult ADHD and Autism services, which has inevitably created waiting lists.  

 The time you will need to wait for an assessment can change frequently, so we are unable to offer precise timescales. Our customer support team are unable to give any more information on waiting times over the phone or web chat; please wait to be contacted by us.    

 If you are already registered with us, we will contact you by email and portal note to arrange the appointment, so please keep looking out for Psychiatry-UK emails and check your portal regularly for messages.  

Under the present terms of our contracts we can only see adults under RTC. We do, of course, have child and adolescent specialists available on a private basis.  

 Children can very often be diagnosed through the Children and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) via school referral.  

To apply for ASD referral under Right to Choose, you must be referred by your GP.  

Alternatively, you can pay for a private ASD assessment with us. Please visit our How it Works page for more information. 

Assuming that your GP is refusing to refer you due to funding concerns and not a clinical reason, you can ask them to read the NHS information governing patient choice.  

Common causes of confusion are the fact that we are not commissioned by your Integrated Care Board (ICB), which is not relevant, or that the GP is only aware of applying through an IFR (Individual Funding Request) and asking the ICB for permission first, which again, is not necessary.  

If you have any further questions, please reach out to our customer support team via our Virtual Assistant.  

Your GP does not need to get prior approval for your referral from the local Integrated Care Board (ICB) and we do not need to seek their approval before starting your treatment.  

 Once we receive the referral from your GP, we will contact you and ask you to complete some further questionnaires. We will then arrange an appointment for you to be assessed by one of our ASD specialist doctors.  

A patient’s legal right to choose a provider covers all aspects of healthcare. However, you can only choose an eligible provider that has an NHS contract for the service you require. At present, Psychiatry UK is only commissioned for Adult ADHD and Adult Autism assessments.  

We are planning to offer alternative treatments such as coaching and therapy in the future, but these are not currently available through Psychiatry UK.  

If you move out of England while you are on our waiting list or during treatment, you will no longer be eligible for Right to Choose. You will need to be referred to a local ASD service, or you can pay for a private assessment.  

Unfortunately, the Right to Choose rules cannot be used to swap provider mid-treatment.  If you are unhappy with your existing care, you will need to reach a resolution with your current provider. 

No. We can only invoice the ICB from the date of the referral. 

We are not able to provide second opinion assessments under Right to Choose, unless you paid for the first assessment privately.