Data sources

For all data sources, the percentage change compared to previous years is calculated from the rate per 100,000 population.

Jurisdictional data are derived independently of the national total, therefore totals may not match. The MBS and PBS national total includes services/prescriptions from Other territories and those with missing patient characteristics. Crisis support organisation jurisdictional data are reported for answered contacts only, where information is available.

Population rates are calculated using Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) estimated resident populations (ERP) for the relevant periods. In this report, population rates are based on the ERP at 30 June of the respective years except for 2025, where the 30 June 2024 population is used.

For ReachOut and Kids Helpline, population rates for people under 25 years are calculated using the ABS ERP for this age group as of 30 June for 2022 to 2024. Rates for 2025 are calculated using projected population values.

For 13YARN, the population rate is calculated using the projected First Nations population from the 2021 census. In this report, population rates are based on the projected population at 30 June for the respective year.

Crisis support organisations such as Lifeline, Kids Helpline, Beyond Blue and 13YARN are available to support Australians experiencing mental health issues. 

This report presents analysis of data provided to AIHW by individual agreement with each service provider.

Note that direct comparisons between organisations are not meaningful due to differences in populations being serviced, service models, funding arrangements, workforce availability and information systems. Comparisons with previous years should also be made with caution as historical trends may be impacted by a range of events, including planned awareness raising campaigns.

Jurisdictional data are derived independently of the national totals, and totals may not match. State/territory information is not available for all answered contacts, and data quality can vary over time.

For all crisis organisations, contacts represents the number of callers to the relevant crisis line. Answered contacts represents the total number of calls answered. There are variations within these definitions for each organisation. See below for more detail.

Lifeline

Contacts represent the number of callers who stayed on the line after listening to the announcements in the menu. Answered contacts represent the total number of calls answered by Lifeline crisis support workers.

From 4 September 2023, data collection for calls to Lifeline's 13YARN crisis support line for First Nations Australians has been separated out from Lifeline Australia telephone support services. Since this change, there may be a small decrease in the Lifeline contacts and answered contacts and subsequent effect on the change compared to previous years.

Kids Helpline

Contacts represent the total number of contacts including phone, webchat and email. Answered contacts represent the total number of contacts answered through phone, webchat and email as well as outbound contacts. Answerable contact attempts exclude phone contact attempts abandoned during the privacy message, which cannot be skipped. This message was increased from 22 to 48 seconds in April 2020.

In 2022 there was a reduction in Kids Helpline numbers reported for each state/territory, compared to prior years. Telephone technology damage during the Queensland floods led to reductions in data for each jurisdiction where 'state/territory' could not be automatically captured. From March 2022 the state/territory data could only be captured if callers agreed to provide it, resulting in a reduction in reported contacts for each state/territory due to non-provision of this data. The number of non-counselling contacts (such as asking for a counsellor, silent calls, etc) has reduced, in-part due to improvements made to the Kids Helpline website and changes in help-seeking behaviour of clients.

There is a minor understatement of reported numbers as they do not include 'outreach' or 'outbound' contacts where counsellors are required to initiate contact.

Beyond Blue

From 6 July 2020, the Australian Government funded Beyond Blue to create a dedicated Coronavirus Mental Wellbeing Support Service to provide free 24/7 mental health support during the pandemic. Contacts represent the total number of contacts from the normal line and COVID-19 line for all modalities including phone, webchat and email. Answered contacts represent the total number of calls answered from the normal line and COVID-19 line through phone, webchat and email.

Beyond Blue launched an enhanced service model on 28 February 2022 with a new service delivery partner. Changes to operational workflows and data entry compliance through the transition period have resulted in lower rates of capture of demographic data and answered contacts. These transition issues have stabilised and improved. Caution is advised when comparing recent data to data recorded prior to 28 February 2022.

Since not all contacts provide Beyond Blue with their location, the numbers quoted for each state/territory will be an understatement, although the National number is complete.

13YARN

13YARN is an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (‘First Nations people’) crisis support line funded by the Australian Government with both a phone line and online component. Even though these services are specific to First Nations people, they are accessible to the whole Australian population. First Nations status is not always collected for all people accessing phone services either due to them not disclosing or not being asked.

13YARN started in March 2022, as such the historical data has a different trend compared to the other crisis lines. The ACT and Tas have been excluded due to low numbers and volatile data trends.

Comparisons with previous years should be made with caution as low numbers can cause volatility in the percentage change, and historical trends may be impacted by a range of events, including the Voice referendum and advertising campaigns.

Contacts represent the number of callers who stayed on the line after listening to the announcements in the menu. Answered contacts represent the total number of calls answered by 13YARN crisis support workers.

This report presents AIHW analysis of data provided by ReachOut and Medicare Mental Health.

Note that comparisons with previous years should be made with caution as historical trends may be impacted by a range of events, including planned awareness raising campaigns.

For both data providers, the average number of website users per day represents the average daily volume for website activity.

ReachOut

Traffic to ReachOut's website is decreasing with widespread changes to user engagement online, the evolving structure of digital platforms, and disruption to the digital ecosystem (for example rapid expansion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) offerings, including alternative search experiences such as Large Language Models).

Increasingly young people search for information within digital platforms (YouTube, TikTok and Instagram) rather than traditional search engines (Google). These platforms are designed to engage users within the app or platform, rather than directing them to expert websites. When users do engage with search engines, AI summaries provide the information sought within the search engine by drawing on the content of ReachOut and others.

To best engage with and support service users, ReachOut is increasingly focused on delivering support direct to users via off-site channels which are not reflected in this reporting.

ReachOut website activity fluctuates and is influenced by a range of factors, including seasonal decreases during school holidays, Google search and external and internal marketing support changes. In late November and early December 2022 SnapChat’s ‘Here For You’ campaign resulted in a spike in ReachOut website activity.

The Google Analytics 4 applies a threshold to data with low numbers for privacy reasons, and it is due to this that ReachOut data for Northern Territory (NT) is not available for the December quarter (Q4) 2023.

Medicare Mental Health

The Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing maintains the national Medicare Mental Health website (www.medicarementalhealth.gov.au). The purpose of the Medicare Mental Health website is to provide information on available services to consumers, which may be provided through Medicare Mental Health or from another free or low-cost mental health provider. The website has a national directory of online, face-to-face, and over-the-phone support. Dates to consider when interpreting the Medicare Mental Health data are:

• 20 March 2020 release of the COVID-19 page and likely explanation of the spike in average daily volume on the Department’s website.
• 31 March 2022 a trial version of the new digital mental health platform was released without promotion. On 29 May 2023, a variation of the trial experience was released to become the main website for all users across Australia seeking to find information and access to a range of digital, phone and face-to-face service offerings to support their mental health and wellbeing needs.
• 13 June 2023 to 30 June 2023 the media buy resulted in a spike in website activity.
• 3 July 2023 to 1 October 2023 release of this report used an updated methodology for counting daily users. This resulted in an unanticipated overestimation of the users per day and average website users per day numbers. The methodology has been updated to address these issues in this report, with updated figures provided from 1 July 2023 onward.
• 18 February 2025 the former Head to Health website was rebranded to Medicare Mental Health.

MBS mental health services are provided by psychiatrists, other medical practitioners (such as paediatricians), general practitioners (GPs), psychologists and other allied health professionals. The services described here are provided in a range of settings – including hospitals, consulting rooms, home visits, telephone and videoconferencing – as defined in the Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS).

The information in this report relates only to mental health services that are claimed under specific mental health care MBS item numbers. Therefore, the reported number of mental health services does not represent all patients who receive mental health care. The date is determined from the date the service was processed by Services Australia, rather than the date the service was provided.

The drop in service numbers in late December to early January is a seasonal phenomenon which has been observed for the same period in previous years.

This report presents AIHW analysis of MBS data sourced from the Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

MBS data were extracted 16/02/2026 and are subject to change.

Further information on mental health MBS items can be found in the Medicare mental health services section of the Mental Health Online Report.

MBS mental health telehealth services

In March 2020, the Australian Government introduced additional services to the MBS to support provision of health care via telehealth (telephone and videoconference). Telehealth was used as an alternative to face-to-face healthcare services to provide protection for both consumers and health care providers during the COVID-19 pandemic. In December 2021, the Australian Government announced that telehealth will become a permanent feature of the MBS (Department of Health 2021). Prior to their introduction, telehealth represented only around 1% of all mental health MBS services.

Better Access

Better Access to Psychiatrists, Psychologists and General Practitioners (Better Access) is a subset of MBS mental health services. Services under the Better Access initiative are available for people with a clinically diagnosed mental disorder to receive up to 10 individual or 10 group mental health services per calendar year up to a maximum of 10 sessions (Department of Health, Disability and Ageing 2025). In response to the pandemic, the Australian Government doubled the number of sessions to 20 per year until 31 December 2022 and made these available to residents of aged care facilities for the first time. Access to these additional 10 sessions ceased from 31 December 2022 (Department of Health and Aged Care 2022a). An independent evaluation of the Better Access initiative commenced in August 2021, and the evaluation report was released in December 2022 (Department of Health and Aged Care 2022b).

The Australian Government subsidises the cost of some prescription medicines listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) and the Repatriation Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (RPBS). Statistics relating to PBS scripts dispensed may be subject to change due to late claims and adjustments. Medicines supplied to public hospital inpatients and private scripts (pharmacy prescriptions not dispensed under the PBS) are not included.

Medications are reported in this section as 5 selected groups as classified in the Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical (ATC) Classification System: Antipsychotics (code N05A), Anxiolytics (code N05B), Hypnotics and sedatives (code N05C), Antidepressants (code N06A) and Psychostimulants, agents used for ADHD and nootropics (code N06B) – prescribed by all medical practitioners (that is, general practitioners (GPs), non-psychiatrist specialists and psychiatrists). This information does not include private prescriptions.

Data include PBS subsided (above-co-payment) and under-co-payment prescriptions.

This report presents AIHW analysis of PBS and RPBS data sourced from the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

PBS data were extracted 19/01/2026 and are subject to change.

The most recent 3 weeks of PBS mental health-related prescription data (8 December to 28 December 2025) are forecast estimates. These estimates are produced using statistical modelling that identifies patterns in historical data to provide an indication of recent activity while official PBS claims data are being finalised. Because these values are modelled rather than observed, they may differ from the final PBS data released in future updates.

Historical data may differ from previously published data due to data resupply.

Further information on mental health PBS items can be found in the Mental health prescriptions section of the Mental Health Online Report.

PBS medication groups

The Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical (ATC) codes are assigned to medicines based on the organs or systems they act on. Mental health specific medication act on the nervous system. The following table outlines the ATC code and its definition for each of the medication groups presented in this section which are relevant to mental health (WHO Collaborating Centre for Drug Statistics Methodology 2023).

60 day prescriptions

Recent changes to enable 60-days of medication have meant people can get twice the medication on a single prescription. To qualify, patients must:

• have a stable health condition
• have received a new 60-day prescription
• have discussed this with their prescriber and be assessed as suitable.

From 1 September 2024 this applies to almost 300 medications on the PBS, including 14 mental health medications which are contained in the Antidepressants (N06A) ATC3 drug class. This has resulted in a reduction in the number and rate of these prescriptions dispensed (Department of Health and Aged Care 2023).

For further information please see 60-day prescriptions.

PBS data forecasting

The most recent weeks of PBS mental health-related prescription data are forecast estimates (marked with dotted line in graphs). These estimates are produced using statistical modelling (Prophet) that identifies patterns in historical data to provide an indication of recent activity while official PBS claims data are being finalised. Since these values are modelled rather than observed, they may differ from the final PBS data released in future updates.

Department of Health and Aged Care (2022a) Factsheet for Additional 10 MBS Mental Health Sessions, Department of Health and Aged Care, Australian Government, accessed 15 June 2023.

Department of Health and Aged Care (2022b) Evaluation of the Better Access initiative – final report, Department of Health and Aged Care, Australian Government, accessed 15 June 2023.

Department of Health and Aged Care (2023) Cheaper medicines, Department of Health and Aged Care, Australian Government, accessed 26 October 2023.

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing (2025) Better Access Initiative, Department of Health, Disability and Ageing, Australian Government, accessed 10 November 2025.

WHO Collaborating Centre for Drug Statistics Methodology (2023) International language for drug utilization research, WHO Collaborating Centre for Drug Statistics Methodology, accessed 20 December 2023.