North East England, Hartlepool to Newcastle: sexual health and meeting safely

The North East has good free testing, including several areas that will post a kit to your door. Every service listed here is free and confidential, and you can go straight to it without seeing your GP. Details checked on 18 October 2026.

At a glance: your local route

The North East splits into four testing areas, each with a slightly different route. Kits by post are the easy option if you feel fine; clinics are for symptoms, PEP and anything you'd rather talk through.

For Sunderland, Gateshead, South Tyneside, Middlesbrough, Stockton and Redcar and Cleveland, use the NHS clinic finder.

Hartlepool and Teesside

Hartlepool Borough Council lists Teesside Together as its free, confidential sexual health service. The Hartlepool clinic is at Park Road Towers, TS24 7PT:

Book through teessidetogether.co.uk. Terrence Higgins Trust also offers free, confidential rapid testing for HIV, hepatitis C and syphilis in the area, which is handy if you want an answer quickly.

Newcastle

Newcastle's sexual health clinic is at 6–8 Ravensworth Terrace, NE4 6AU. Call 0191 273 6222 for opening times or to speak to staff. Newcastle City Council also points residents to the online service SH.UK to request a test, emergency contraception (for people assigned female at birth) or free condoms.

Two other local organisations worth knowing: Blue Sky Trust supports people living with HIV and their families, and the C-Card scheme gives free condoms to 13 to 25-year-olds after a short induction at a C-Card outlet.

County Durham and Darlington

If you live in County Durham or Darlington, you can order a free kit for chlamydia, gonorrhoea and syphilis through sh24.org.uk, and a free HIV test through freetesting.hiv, at any time of day. People aged 16 to 24 can also pick up a chlamydia and gonorrhoea test from most pharmacies in County Durham. Clinic appointments are booked through County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust, which also runs walk-in clinics.

Northumberland and North Tyneside

Northumbria Healthcare posts free STI home testing kits to people aged 16 or over who live in Northumberland or North Tyneside and have no symptoms. The kit tests for chlamydia, gonorrhoea, HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis B and C, using swabs, a urine sample and a finger-prick blood sample. Order online or by phone on 0344 728 0554, or collect a kit from one of the trust's hubs.

Kits take three to five working days to arrive, in discreet packaging, and results come within two weeks of the lab receiving your samples. If you've heard nothing by then, the results line is 0344 728 0316. A health adviser rings you if anything needs treatment. Not a resident? You can still go to the clinics for a test.

Which samples to take

A home kit only checks the places you swab, so match the samples to the sex you've had. Northumbria Healthcare's guidance for its kits is a useful rule of thumb:

Use a fresh swab for each site, and follow the instructions in your own kit if they differ.

Time-critical help

HIV PEP can be taken up to 72 hours after sex but is more likely to work within 24. Contact a sexual health clinic straight away; if it's closed, Newcastle Hospitals says every A&E department in the North East can supply five days of PEP. Don't sit on it until Monday.

Emergency contraception is free at clinics, and most pharmacies in England have offered the morning-after pill free since October 2025. Newcastle City Council notes that some emergency contraception works up to five days after unprotected sex, but the sooner the better. See the sexual health hub.

After a sexual assault

The North East has three sexual assault referral centres (SARCs). All offer medical care and support whether or not you want to report to the police.

You can phone for advice or an appointment; the service is free and confidential. Elsewhere, or if you're under 16, find the right service through the NHS.

For support at any hour, the Rape Crisis 24/7 Support Line (0808 500 2222) is free and open to anyone aged 16 or over in England and Wales. In an emergency call 999; if you can't speak safely, press 55.

Reporting scams and crimes

• Dating fraud: call your bank via 159, which can't be spoofed, then report to Report Fraud on 0300 123 2040.
• Threats, harassment or intimate image abuse: Cleveland Police (Hartlepool and Teesside), Durham Constabulary (County Durham and Darlington) or Northumbria Police (Tyneside, Wearside and Northumberland) on 101, or 999.
• A member's profile or messages: report the username through the members help centre.

Meeting someone in the North East

A first meet works best on neutral ground: a busy bar on the Quayside or a café in town beats a pick-up from your front door. Keep the first one short, tell a mate where you'll be, and know how you're getting home, especially if you're crossing between Teesside, Durham and Tyneside late in the evening.

If you're not sure how to raise testing with a new partner, try something like this, as an example: "Before we meet up properly, I got tested last month and I'm all clear. Have you been recently?" Asking early, before anything happens, keeps it a practical question rather than a mood-killer.

Before meeting a match, read the meeting safely checklist, and if you've never had a test before, the free STI testing guide explains what to expect. National helplines are on the safety and consent page, and the Yorkshire and the Humber and Scotland guides cover the neighbours.