Key psychiatrist groups are calling for a boost to the industry's workforce and increased funding amid concerns about the profession's numbers.
The National Association of Practising Psychiatrists (NAPP) said the pandemic had provided greater encouragement for people to seek psychiatric support.
It said a successful push to de-stigmatise mental illness over the past several years was also having a significant impact.
NAPP president Professor Phillip Morris said the level of demand was unprecedented.
"I've been in the profession for quite a while and I've never seen the numbers we're seeing at the moment of people coming forward from GPs, and also self-referred to psychologists, to get care for psychiatric problems," he said.
Appointments booked year in advance
The heightened demand and need for more psychiatrists was also being felt in regional areas.
Finley GP Alam Yoosuff said he was struggling to secure timely psychiatrist appointments for new patients across Albury-Wodonga and Shepparton.
"Two weeks ago I got an appointment for next year in August," he said.
"Then we look at sending patients to Wagga, Melbourne and things like that, but they're booked too.
"You can't get anyone anywhere near into a proper and timely appointment."
Dr Yoosuff said for one patient he had written 12 referral letters to private psychiatrists, but most were not taking new appointments.
He said trying to secure a psychiatrist referral was taking up a lot of the practice's time.
"It's an impost on us, our colleagues and friends who are doing valuable work, and also an impost on our reception and practice management staff," he said.
"They need to ring, fax the same letter again and again and try and negotiate a right time and a place."
He said staff were having to deal with difficult phone calls around the issue as well.
"Not so very good phone call messages from the patients thinking that we are gatekeepers or we have been the problem of getting them across to an appointment," he said.
Dr Yoosuff said virtual appointments were not always the answer either given out-of-pocket costs, long wait times and some patients preferring face-to-face consultation.
'It's not just about numbers'
Professor Morris said the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists needed to look very closely at increasing the profession's workforce.
But the college's president, Assistant Professor Vinay Lakra, said they had seen a steady increase in the number of people on the college's training pathway over many years.
He said what was needed was more state and federal funding for training positions and supervisors.
"The restriction in terms of how many people can join psychiatry training is not because of the college, it's because of the training positions that are funded, or not funded for that matter," he said.
Dr Lakra said there were around 4,000 psychiatrists in the country and 1,800 trainees.
He said besides funding for more places, mental health services needed to be funded appropriately as well.
"We need to look at a multitude of solutions to this issue. It's not just about numbers ... but whether we can do some of the things differently," he said.
"[Such as] access to those services for those people who need them most and how we can work collaboratively with the GPs."
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