Evidence-based articles about health anxiety, OCD, practical methods, and recovery.
Learn about physical symptoms that can occur with anxiety, why health anxiety can make bodily sensations feel more noticeable, and how checking and reassurance can maintain the cycle.
Learn how to overcome health anxiety using evidence-based CBT strategies, including reducing checking, reassurance seeking and symptom searching and learning to tolerate uncertainty.
Exposure and Response Prevention can help reduce checking, Googling, and reassurance-seeking. Here's how ERP works for health anxiety.
Tell your doctor about both your physical concerns and the anxiety surrounding them. Explain what you have noticed, what you fear, how often you check or seek reassurance, and how this affects your daily life. Ask your doctor to explain whether tests are needed, what happens next and when to follow up. The goal is to leave with a clear plan and access to suitable support, rather than complete certainty.
You know Googling symptoms makes anxiety worse. Here's why the urge feels so strong, and practical ways to start breaking the cycle.
Natalie Altman talks about the emotional toll of health anxiety and OCD, from late-night reassurance texts to why logic alone does not help.
Natalie Dyson talks about body checking, social media triggers, reassurance-seeking, and daily life inside health anxiety.
Prof Lynne Drummond explains where health anxiety overlaps with OCD, why reassurance backfires, and how exposure helps.
Dr Karen Bowles explains what doctors see when health anxiety walks in, why more tests often do not help, and what support can change.
Sam O'Keefe's health anxiety began at 12 and escalated through panic, DPDR, and isolation. Here's what helped her recover.