Allied Health Professions

Allied Health Professionals (AHPs) play a critical role in the assessment, treatment and rehabilitation of people of all ages. A variety of professions come under the AHP umbrella including dieticians, physiotherapists, radiographers, etc. While they represent many diverse areas of expertise and practice, and work with different client groups, they are as one in being committed to health improvement. Health screening, health promotion, public health and social inclusion initiatives are often integral to their specific clinical roles.

AHPs deliver a wide range of cancer services, such as diagnostic and screening programmes and radiotherapy. They also provide support and rehabilitation after surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy, and when palliative care services are accessed. They are therefore closely involved in local cancer networks, working to develop action plans to progress improvements in prevention and treatment in local areas.

Many AHPs are involved working within multi-professional teams in mental health services delivering services to children, adolescents, adults and older people. AHPs are also extensively involved in delivering services to children.

Occupational therapists, physiotherapists and speech and language therapists often work across health, education and social care settings, supporting children to participate in their learning and development at school.

Art Therapists

Provide psychotherapeutic interventions for mental health, learning disability, and palliative care clients across all age groups enabling them to gain insight and promote the resolution of difficulties through the use of art materials.

Dieticians

Work with people across all age groups with special dietary requirements (or those needing advice and education on nutrition).to promote nutritional wellbeing, prevent food-related problems, treat disease, and translate the science of nutrition into practical information.

Drama Therapists

Encourage clients across all age groups; especially mental health, to experience their physicality, to develop an ability to express the whole range of their emotions, and to increase their insight and knowledge of themselves and others.

Music Therapists

Facilitate interaction and development of insight into mental health, learning disability, and physical disability.clients' behaviour and emotional difficulties through music.

Occupational Therapists

Assess, rehabilitate and treat people using purposeful activity and occupation to prevent disability and promote health and independent function. Therapists work with all age groups where physical or mental functioning impact on everyday life, especially children, older adults and those with chronic disease.

Orthoptists

Diagnose and treat eye movement disorders and defects of binocular vision. Mainly work with children and older adults.

Orthotists

Design and fit orthoses (such as callipers and braces) which provide support to parts of patients' bodies and compensate for paralysed muscles, provide relief from pain, or prevent physical deformities.

Physiotherapists

Assess and treat people with physical problems caused by accident, ageing, disease or disability, using physical approaches to maximise the patient's recovery and alleviate pain.

Prosthetists

Provide care and advice on rehabilitation for patients who have lost or were born without a limb, fitting the best possible artificial replacement.

Podiatrists

Diagnose and treat abnormalities of the foot across all age groups - mainly older adults and those with chronic disease - e.g. vascular, diabetes. They also give professional advice on prevention of foot problems and on proper care of the foot.

Diagnostic Radiographers

Produce high quality images on film and other recording media, using all kinds of radiation.

Therapeutic Radiographers

Treat mainly cancer patients using ionising radiation and, occasionally, drugs. They provide care across the entire spectrum of cancer services.

Speech & Language Therapists

Assess, diagnose and treat people in all age groups - especially children and those with neurological or cancer-related problems, with communication and/or swallowing difficulties.