Phone and online helpline services: On the Line trends Jul-Sep 2021

24-Nov-2021

As Australia gradually opens up and life is transitioning to ‘living with COVID’, On the Line is looking at the trends across our counselling services during the first quarter of this financial year.

Our counselling services had steady demand

Overall, inbound counselling calls and online chats to our services remained relatively consistent each month. However, we did see increases across two areas:

• MensLine had an 11% increase in calls received during August 2021 compared to the previous month.
• Our suicide prevention services had a 7% increase in calls received during September 2021 compared to the previous month.

Mental health is the number one reason Australians call our helplines

Continuing the trend from last financial year, the number one reason people contacted one of our services was to get help with a mental health issue. This was particularly significant across our low intensity counselling services, where over half of the presenting issues were mental health.

The second most common reason for calling was about relationships. For our male callers, around a quarter of the presenting issues was about relationship issues.

Suicide prevention and safety planning accounted for nearly a quarter of the presenting issues to our suicide prevention helplines.

Compared to the last financial year, we saw slight increases in anger management, loneliness, parenting concerns, physical health issues, and social isolation as the main reason for calling one of our services.

Accessing online mental health resources is on the rise

Over the quarter, we also saw a steady increase in clients accessing online mental health resources on our websites:

• MensLine had a 27% increase in resource page views in August compared to the previous month, followed by a further 21% increase in September.
• Our suicide prevention services saw a 30% increase in resource page views in August compared to the previous month, followed by a 12% increase in September.

Our counselling services are available 24/7

If you or someone you know needs help, please call one of our free mental health services to speak to a professional counsellor:

MensLine Australia – 1300 78 99 78

SuicideLine Victoria – 1300 651 251

Suicide Call Back Service – 1300 659 467

If it is an emergency, please dial 000.

Want to talk about partnerships?

On the Line delivers mental health and counselling services across Australia. We operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our services are delivered by professional counsellors who support clients across the mental health continuum: from low intensity to those who are high risk and have complex needs.

If your organisation wants to talk to us about partnership opportunities and counselling services, please email us at businessdevelopment@ontheline.org.au