Support for Veterans

Useful Links

Op Courage England

Veterans’ First Point Scotland

Veterans’ Wales

NI Veterans’ Support Office

For Veterans in England:

Op COURAGE

Op COURAGE is an NHS mental health specialist service designed to help serving personnel due to leave the military, reservists, armed forces veterans and their families.

How Op Courage can help.

Op COURAGE can help you and your family with a range of support and treatment, including:

• supporting you with intensive emergency care and treatment if you’re in a crisis
• helping you transition from military to civilian life by providing mental health care with Defence Medical Services (DMS)
• supporting armed forces families affected by mental health problems, including helping you access local services
• helping you recognise and treat early signs of mental health problems as well as more advanced mental health conditions and psychological trauma
• helping you to access other NHS mental health services if you need them, such as finding an NHS psychological therapies service (IAPT) and eating disorder services
• helping you get in touch with charities and local organisations who can support your wider health and wellbeing needs, such as housing, relationships, finances, employment, drug and alcohol misuse and social support

Who will I speak to?

Everyone at Op COURAGE is either from the armed forces community or is experienced in working with serving personnel, reservists, veterans and their families.

They understand military life and the courage it takes to speak with someone. They will work with you to make sure you get the right type of specialist care, support and treatment. 

For Veterans in Scotland:

Veterans First Point:

Veterans First Point (V1P) has been developed by Veterans for Veterans and is staffed by an alliance of clinicians and Veterans. The service we provide is free at the point of access and provided as part of the NHS. 

For Veterans in Wales:

Veterans NHS Wales:

The potential adverse impact of active military service on health and wellbeing has long been recognised with physical and psychological symptoms being commonly reported by veterans. Concerns regarding impaired health and wellbeing amongst veterans have achieved a high profile recently because of the current service demands made of military personnel.

The Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) remains committed to improving support and treatment for veterans. This, together with the initial success of the Welsh Pilot Project, led to the creation of a National Task and Finish Group to develop a service specification. The Group met on five occasions between 16 July 2009 and 3 December 2009. The specification has been informed by evidence obtained from the following sources:

a.     Existing literature regarding the needs of veterans and the provision of services for them.
b.     Discussions with veterans, their carers and individuals involved in the psychosocial care of veterans.
c.     Ongoing psychosocial research into the needs of veterans living in Wales.
d.     The experiences of the six Community Veterans Mental Health Service Pilot Projects across the United Kingdom, with particular reference to the Pilot Project based in Wales which covered the Cardiff and Vale and Cwm Taf NHS Trusts (LHBs from 1 October 2010). 

For Veterans in Northern Ireland:

Northern Ireland Veterans Support Office:

The Northern Ireland Veterans’ Support Office (NIVSO) is the lead support and signposting service linking individual Veterans, Veterans’ groups, statutory and non-statutory bodies, and charities supporting Veterans in Northern Ireland.

We build the capacity to deliver the Armed Forces Covenant – the Nation’s commitment to Veterans. It is a pledge that ensures Veterans and their families have access to a wide variety of support and are treated fairly.

We work collaboratively with the Office of the Veterans’ Commissioner for Northern Ireland, and support individual Veterans, their families and carers, as well as groups and organisations that provide a range of support services and activities for Veterans.

We educate key players within local communities regarding the needs of Veterans, offering solutions to problems, suggestions and ideas, advocacy, signposting and practical help.

We advocate a holistic approach to providing options to Veterans and help them to make informed decisions. We sit at the heart of the network, where we interact top down and bottom up, and endeavour to find a solution to all Veterans’ diverse needs.