When to seek urgent help
Seek emergency help for suicidal thoughts, severe unmanageable panic, psychosis, severe depression, substance crisis, or inability to keep yourself or others safe.
Last reviewed 8 August 2026
Call 000 or go to your nearest emergency department if you or someone else is in immediate danger. Some situations need urgent help now, not a scheduled appointment: this article lists the warning signs and exactly what to do.
Warning signs that need emergency help
Seek emergency help for any of the following:
- Thoughts of suicide or self-harm, including planning, or feeling you might act on such thoughts.
- Severe, unmanageable panic. Panic that will not settle and that you cannot manage with your usual strategies.
- Psychosis. Hearing or seeing things others don't, fixed beliefs disconnected from reality, or severe confusion.
- Severe depression with inability to function. Unable to get up, eat, care for yourself or meet basic responsibilities.
- Substance crisis or overdose: a suspected overdose, or a substance-related situation that is out of control.
- Inability to keep yourself or others safe: any situation where safety cannot be maintained, including for children in your care.
What to do
- If there is immediate danger, call 000 or go straight to your nearest emergency department.
- If you need to talk to someone urgently but are not in immediate danger, call a 24/7 crisis line: the NSW Mental Health Line is 1800 011 511 and Lifeline is 13 11 14. The full list of crisis numbers is in emergency and crisis support and at /emergency-assistance.
- If you're worried about someone else, stay with them where safe to do so, and make the call for them.
Why not the clinic?
Norwest Wellbeing is not a crisis service. We provide scheduled clinical hypnotherapy on weekdays, and no one is available after hours or for urgent response. In the situations above, crisis services will help you faster and better than we can.
Non-urgent concerns
If what you're experiencing is distressing but not an emergency (persistent anxiety, poor sleep, a habit you want to change) that's the territory scheduled therapy is for. Contact us via /contact during business hours, Monday–Friday 9:00 am – 5:00 pm (contact us and reception hours), or start with is hypnotherapy right for me.
