Every practice has a founding story that sounds tidier in hindsight than it felt at the time. Ours begins with one psychologist, a great many hours of driving, and a Territory that had almost nowhere to send people.
What follows is how Darwin Psychology Services became what it is — including the parts that were accidents, and the convictions that came out of them and have not shifted since.
Louise McKenna began practising as a psychologist in the Northern Territory. At the time the Territory had a handful of psychologists in private practice, and families in Palmerston and the rural area routinely waited months — or flew south — for an assessment.
A decade of work across schools, remote communities, courts and hospitals. Long drives, small planes, and assessments conducted at kitchen tables and under mango trees. That period shaped a conviction the practice still holds: an assessment written without seeing where someone actually lives is only half an assessment.
The practice was established as a dedicated psychology service for Territory families — general enough to be a first point of contact, specialised enough to handle complex assessment without referring interstate.
Growing demand from Palmerston and the rural area led to purpose-designed rooms at Woodlake Boulevard in Durack: quiet waiting areas, dedicated assessment space, and a room set up for play-based work with young children.
Territory employers began asking for a local EAP provider — one whose counsellors understood shift work, remote postings, wet season isolation and the particular pressures of the Territory's emergency services. The program has grown every year since.
The Terminal One Building at Winnellie opened as our second location, closer to Darwin's industrial and government employers and easier to reach for clients coming from the northern suburbs and the city.
The pandemic pushed the practice into telehealth in a matter of weeks. What began as an emergency measure turned out to solve a much older Territory problem, and secure video sessions are now a permanent part of how we reach clients on stations, in remote communities and interstate.
The practice became a supervised training site for provisional psychologists and clinical registrars. Growing our own is the only durable answer to the Territory's psychologist shortage — and it lets us offer reduced-fee appointments with supervised clinicians.
Darwin Psychology Services now brings together twelve clinicians and a practice team across Durack and Winnellie, offering assessment, therapy, group programs, telehealth and Employee Assistance across the Northern Territory. A third location is under consideration.
An assessment written without seeing where someone actually lives is only half an assessment. We still go to homes, schools and workplaces when it is the only way to understand what is happening.
A report that a parent cannot take to a school and act on has failed, however sound the testing behind it was. We write for the people who have to do something with it.
Waiting for psychologists to arrive from interstate has never worked for the Territory. Training registrars and provisional psychologists here is the only durable answer to the shortage.
The Territory still has too few psychologists and too many people waiting. Two things are in front of us: opening a third location so that fewer people have a long drive to an appointment, and continuing to train clinicians here rather than recruiting them away from somewhere else.
If you are a psychologist thinking about the Territory, we would like to hear from you — including if you are only thinking about it.
You do not need a referral, and you do not need to know what is wrong before you call. Working that out is part of what we do.