Health anxiety can be one of the most emotionally complex presentations healthcare professionals encounter.

Chronic health anxiety is cyclical in nature and can continue for decades without sufficient intervention. If you are a healthcare professional it is very likely that you regularly meet patients with health anxiety and if you feel powerless, exasperated or uncertain following consultations, you’re not alone. Even the most experienced clinician can feel caught between wanting to help and not knowing how.

In this article, I explore what lies beneath health anxiety and how subtle shifts in the way we approach consultations can gently change its course.

Seeing Beyond the Symptoms

At its core, health anxiety isn’t about attention-seeking or irrational thoughts. It’s a protective response that likely once made sense within the wider context of their life.

Many people with health anxiety have early experiences marked by illness, loss, unpredictability, vulnerability or a lack of relational safety. They may have grown up feeling responsible for keeping themselves or others safe. Over time, that vigilance can turn inward towards the body.

When we view it this way, health anxiety becomes not a flaw to be fixed but a form of care that has become over-developed. What was once adaptive is now overprotective.

The Power of Listening and Language

One of the most therapeutic things you can offer is your presence.
Slowing down and listening creates psychological safety. It tells the patient: “You matter. I want to understand.”

Communicate clearly and with warmth. Avoid jargon or rushed explanations; uncertainty fuels anxiety, so clarity calms.

Even small statements of empathy can make an enormous difference:

“You’ve been through a lot with your health; it’s understandable that you’re looking for further signs of illness”

“You’ve been working so hard to care for yourself, let’s look together at what’s helping and what’s keeping the worry going.”

Acknowledging effort honours the person’s attempts to stay safe and opens the door to collaboration.

Relational Safety as the Medicine

For those whose early lives lacked safety or consistency, the consulting room and your relationship with your patient can become a source of healing.

Relational safety is built through:

• Warmth: eye contact, active listening, kind tone.
• Consistency: keeping follow-ups predictable.
• Attunement: noticing and acknowledging emotion as well as content.
• Transparency: explaining your reasoning and next steps.
• Collaboration: Working with the patient on a shared care plan.

Each of these elements tells the nervous system: “You’re safe here; we can work this through together.”

Encouraging Helpful Coping Beyond the Consultation

A crucial part of supporting patients is helping them build safe, sustainable coping systems outside the consulting room. Invite exploration of alternative forms of safety and connection:

“Alongside our appointments, it could help to find other ways of managing these worries day-to-day so you’re not carrying them alone.”

Helpful strategies may include:

• Talking openly with trusted loved ones about health anxiety so they can respond with empathy, not medical advice.
• Joining a support group where experiences can be shared and normalised.
• Engaging in psychological therapy, particularly trauma-informed or compassion-focused approaches.
• Looking after the body kindly: balanced nutrition, rest, and gentle activity as acts of care rather than fear.
• Practising grounding or mindfulness to soften the urge to check or research.
• Scheduling “worry time” or journaling to contain rumination.
• Reconnecting with meaningful activities: creativity, time in nature, social connection, volunteering, spirituality.
• Using credible health-anxiety resources to learn about the condition and reduce shame.

By helping patients cultivate these tools, you shift care from dependency on reassurance to empowerment through self- and relational regulation.

Look After Yourself Too!

Working with health anxiety can be hard going at times, you’re having to weigh up multiple different factors in the room at once – the patient’s current presentation, past medical history, clinical pathways, risk assessment and management, fear of upsetting the patient or saying the wrong thing…to name just a few.

Finding support for yourself through debriefing, supervision or reflective practice can be an essential part of working with complex cases.

If you would like more support in this area, contact support@healthanxietyhub.com

In Summary

You are not expected to fix health anxiety. But you can:

• Recognise it early and name it clearly.
• Listen with full attention and communicate with clarity and warmth.
• Normalise it as a protective, human response.
• Respect the person’s efforts to care for themselves.
• Reassure responsibly that clinical pathways will always be followed when indicated.
• Collaborate on next steps that share responsibility safely.
• Encourage supportive coping beyond medical settings.
• Reflect and debrief, these cases can touch something in us all, seek your own support when needed.