Considerations When Using Health Insurance

Think of your work with us as an investment. People invest in their retirement plans to ensure they can have a secure and fulfilling future down the road. Paying for our services is no different, only you are investing in your long-term emotional happiness and well-being. Many people begin the search for a therapist or provider by seeing if their health insurance is accepted. Going through insurance may seem like the best investment, but sometimes the lowest cost investment is not the wisest one. There are several reasons that you may want to consider alternatives to using your health insurance.

• Health insurance companies see counseling and psychotherapy as treatment for a mental illness. Insurance companies require that you be diagnosed with a mental health condition for them to pay, and this diagnosis must be reported to your insurance company. This is required even for couples/relationship/family therapy.
• Health insurance companies sometimes want to know what you and your therapist or provider talk about. Insurance companies feel that they need justification to pay for your services, and they sometimes ask questions about the details of sessions. What you talk about should stay between you and your therapist or provider.
• Health insurance companies try to dictate how your therapist or provider do their job and how long you should receive services. Since insurance companies consider therapy a treatment for an illness, they think that you should “get better” in a set period of time. Insurance companies put limits on how many sessions you can have and sometimes even tell therapists and providers how to do their jobs.

Though none of these concerns should be reasons to decide against engaging in therapy, we feel it is important for our clients to know these realities when it comes to healthcare coverage for mental health and wellness services. Please do not hesitate to reach out to us directly if you have any questions.