Many people have very stressful lives for a variety of reasons. Stress can lead to anxiety. Anxiety is a feeling of unease, worry or fear and too much anxiety can make you tired and unable to function. Anxiety can have psychological and physical symptoms such as:

Difficulty sleeping; Being irritable; feeling worried; not being able to relax; feeling tearful; palpitations, headaches, sweating, breathing faster, panic attacks, loss of appetite, butterflies in your tummy and much more. You should see a doctor if you have any of these symptoms too.

Sometimes, if they diagnose anxiety, medications can help. Some people also try other methods to help their anxiety. This may include relaxation techniques, exercise, counselling. clinical hypnotherapy or psychological treatment. A doctor will help you decide what’s best for you.

Our private practice offers counselling and clinical hypnotherapy, to help you with anxiety. Many people find these therapies very helpful in addition to their doctors treatment. Our experienced counsellors and clinical hypnotherapist are available for appointments in a discrete, calm environment at a time to suit you, for a modest fee. Our counsellors are Julia Gregory and Chris Browning, and our hypnotherapist is Lynne Pryce-Jones (see their pages on our website).

For adults betwenn 19-64 years, to stay healthy it is recommended we do two types of exercies, aerobic exercises and strength exercises. Experts say about 20 mins of aerobic activity (that raises your heart rate a little) such as walking or cycling and exercise that strengthen all your muscles.

Thats easy to say, but difficult to do if you have a busy life like us! It can also be difficult for people with limited mobility, as some of us have. Some of the things we try and do to help us get more exercise are:

Walking to work, school,or the local shops instead of driving, or parking further away from work or school and walk or use a mobility aid for the last little bit.

Parking at the far side of a supermarket car park to get more exercise in.

Doing hand weights with small weights or objects at home.

Minimise sitting if possible.

Use the stairs in work than the lift.

Arrange to exercise with a friend, so it’s harder to chicken out!

Go for a walk or exercise with a mobility aid around your workplace building in your lunch break- even if its for only 10 minutes.

Try to do sit-ups or core strengthening exercise and build them into your daily routine eg. after brushing your teeth.

Try going for a walk, cycle or do an outdoor activity on the weekend, rather than going shopping or watching TV.

Little things daily are more realistic than playing team sports every day! We’d certainly love to have the time to do this, but have other time committments in our life, so that perhaps we can only fit sports in once or twice a week.

Good luck trying to build exercise into your life! We’ll be trying to do the same! We hope that it keeps us active and well for as long as possible.

Are you finding it difficult to get to your GP, or do you have a problem that has gone on and on and not improved?

We can help at a time to suit you and for a reasonable fee of £40. Maybe you are due a smear and haven’t managed to book it in. We have female doctors that can do this for you and tests results return in just a few days. Perhaps you have had ongoing discomfort, period problems, soreness or discharge? We can help with this and provide treatment in our discrete clinic. Daytime. evening and weekend appointments available. All appointments must be made in advance, as we are not a drop in clinic. We aim to offer you  discrete, gold standard private healthcare at a price that won’t break the bank. We look forward to helping you.

Call 0845 868 4480 or 07531 194 797 or Email: enquiry@healthfirstconsulting.co.uk

Sometimes it’s easier to talk to a counsellor than to relatives or friends. During therapy, a trained therapist listens to you and helps you find your own answers to problems, without judging you. The therapist will give you time to talk, cry, shout or just think. It’s an opportunity to look at your problems in a different way with someone who’ll respect and encourage your opinions and the decisions you make. Often, you’ll talk one-to-one with the therapist.

Although there are many different types of therapy, they all have a similar aim: to make you feel better. Some people say that talking therapies don’t always make their problems go away, but they find it easier to cope with them and feel happier.

Some people use the terms ’counselling’ and ’psychotherapy’ interchangeably.There is much overlap between the two and,  practitioners will want to be sure that what they offer is appropriate for you before there is any committment on either side; they will be happy to explain their approach to you.

Counselling and psychotherapy is a contractual arrangement by which a practitioner meets a client, in privacy and confidence, to explore distress the client may be experiencing. This may be a difficulty they are facing; their dissatisfaction with life; or loss of a sense of direction or purpose and many other things.

One of the aims of counselling is to guide us from feeling like victims of circumstances, to feeling like we have some control over our lives.

BACP Accredited Counsellors (The British Association for Counselling and Psychtherapy), have achieved a substantial level of training and experience approved by the Association. These practitioners will have the letters ’BACP’ as part of their qualification and registration.

All counsellors at HealthFirst Consulting are registered with BACP.

Vaccination is one of the most useful medical tool that exists. Preventing disease by vaccination has changed the World. Smallpox has been eradicated and polio become a disease of the past in the UK. If you think you may be at risk of infections, either through your work, lifestyle or travel, why not give us a call to enquire about the vaccinations we can offer? Our Hepatitis B vaccine and Gardasil vaccine (HPV/cervical cancer and genital wart vaccine), are very popular.

Welcome to our blog!

We thought if you are considering making an appointment at our clinic, that this may be useful.

HealthFirst Consulting is an independent clinic registered with Health Inspectorate Wales. We are based in the village of Fleur-de-Lys, Gwent. Our newly refurbished consulting suite is discretely sited and has easy access by public transport and on road parking. Appointments are by pre-arrangement only, so we can ensure that your experience of a consultation is as hassle free and relaxing as possible. We aim to see patients at appointed times, so no waiting and no hassle. Appointments are available during the day, after working hours in the evenings and on weekends. Healthcare to suit your busy life. Our doctor works for the NHS and has also worked in the independent sector for three years. We offer womens health and mens health checks, cervical smears, vaccinations for Hepatitis and HPV, infection testing, STI testing, contraception, pre-IVF testing and treatments. Our clinic is confidential and offers care of a high standard.

We also have a Harley Street trained Aesthetics practitioner offering Botox, Dermal fillers, PRP, peels and microneedling. She is very experienced and has excellent results. Our clinic is the perfect place to have these treatments, with top of the range facilities, confidentiality and discretion. Please contact us for more details.

We look forward to helping you, as your health is our priority!