Skip to content

About us

We are a specialist NHS mental health trust with a focus on training and education as well as providing a full range of mental health services and therapies for children and their families, young people and adults.

Clinical, education and research

We are a global centre of excellence in clinical practice, training and education, and innovation in the fields of mental health and emotional wellbeing.

Our distinctive approach to mental and emotional wellbeing focusses on the importance we attach to developmental, psychological and social experience at all stages of people’s lives

  • Our vision, mission and values

    For 100 years, the Tavistock and Portman clinics have embodied a distinctive way of thinking about and understanding mental distress, mental health and emotional wellbeing.  Our vision Our vision is to be a leader in mental health care and education, using talking and relational therapies to make a meaningful difference to people’s lives Our mission…

  • Our people

    Our people make us the extraordinary and unique organisation that we are, and collectively we enable the delivery of individualised, personal, and effective care, which everyone plays an important role in achieving. Work with us Thinking of applying for a role at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust? See our vacancies and find out…

  • Our board

    Our board provides effective and proactive leadership of the Trust within a framework of processes, procedures and controls which enable risk to be assessed and managed.

  • Council of governors

    Our governors are the guardians of our mission and values, and they help us achieve our objectives. We have three different categories of governor; public, staff and stakeholder. Governors have an important role to play, although they are not responsible for the day-to-day running of the trust, and cannot veto decisions made by the board.…

  • Our history

    We have been at the forefront of exploring mental health and wellbeing since the First World War. Our history informs our mission and our values – we work to pioneer the development and delivery of effective clinical interventions, and to be a national and international centre of excellence for training and education. Mental health services…

We contribute to the pool of ideas through our own research and development, but are also committed to bringing together the best ideas of the time, old and new, from inside and out, together with the most gifted and able professionals in our fields of endeavour. We aim to share our ideas and practice through as many routes as possible.

We aim constantly to be evolving in nature and form in relation to the environment in which we work, to ensure that our contribution remains relevant.

Someone in our library

Our publications

We publish information about our Trust following the Information Commissioner’s Office’s model publication scheme. 

Our strategy

Our new strategy signals our values and sets out a plan to support all of us in coming together to deliver its ambition via a consistent way of working on quality improvement over the next three years. At its core is strengthening our relationship with service users, carers, students, all our partners and each other. This is our plan to ensure services, education, training and research are contemporary and fit for future as we consider merger partners.

Our strategy diagram

Description of image

The diagram is a pyramid with several different sections.

  • The first section at the top of the pyramid says ‘Patients and students’
  • The second section is titled ‘Our vision’ and says ‘Our vision is to be a leader in mental health care and education, promoting talking therapies and relational therapies to make a meaningful difference to people’s lives’
  • The third section shows our four values; Excellence, inclusivity, compassion and respect
  • The fourth section is titled ‘Strategic pillars’, and shows five coloured boxes, with each saying; Outstanding patient care, education and training, partnerships for research and innovation, people culture, and sustainability
  • The fifth section is titled ‘2023/24 objectives’ and lists;
    • waiting lists
    • student intake
    • T&P voice
    • bullying and harrassment
    • team level budgets
    • user experience
    • sustainable partnerships
    • partnerships for prevention
    • equalities, diversity and inclusion
    • medium term financial plan.
  • The final section at the bottom of the pyramid is titled ‘Our mission’ and says ‘Our mission is to work in partnership with people, families and communities to provide high-quality specialist mental healthcare, alleviate emotional distress and pioneer innovative education and research.’

Our 2023/24 ambitions

  • 18 week referral to treatment
    Our aim is that no service user waits longer than 18 weeks for access to first treatment
  • User experience
    Our aim is for 90% performance in service user satisfaction / experience scores
  • Student intake
    To grow our international student intake by 15% annually and increase our national reach
  • Sustainable partnerships
    To have in place income generating international partnerships that support innovation and care improvements on a global scale
  • Prevention centre for children and young people
    To have established a prevention centre for children and young people’s mental health to support service users, carers and families in Camden and beyond
  • Host an annual thought leadership conference
    To position ourselves as thought leaders in thinking about how best to meet the mental health and wellbeing needs of Londoners
  • Improve equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) scores
    To improve our EDI score by the end of March 2025
  • Reduction of bullying, harassment and abuse
    Our aim is for a reduction of bullying, harassment and abuse by 5% per annum
  • A financially balanced plan
    To have a financially balanced plan for each year of the strategy and medium-term financial strategy in place
  • Enhanced budgetary controls
    To have enhanced budgetary controls and monthly reconciliation of activity, finance and workforce.

Our Care Quality Commission rating

In May 2023 our regulator the Care Quality Commission (CQC) rated our Trust as Good across all categories, and Outstanding for Effective.

In January 2021 the CQC rated our Gender Identity Development Service inadequate.

Our partners

We are proud to work with a variety of partners across North Central London and nationally to help support the mental health and wellbeing of patients, staff.

North Central London Integrated Care System logo
Cavendish Square Group logo