Leeds student mental health crisis rise

Urgent action needs to be taken to tackle a worrying rise in the number of students suffering from mental health problems, said Dr Angela Goyal, Leeds GP.

The number of patients suffering from psychological distress had rocketed.Dr Goyal, who is also a YEP columnist, suggested factors could be the pressures of social media, exam stress and financial worries.

She said: “I could have a whole day where a significant proportion of young people I am seeing have mental health problems – so much so, we now have mental health professionals based at our practice specifically to deal with this. “Students come to me and tell me they feel isolated at university. Exam pressure is another issue and they also might be having to work to finance themselves at university, which is often too much to cope with.