Insurance
I am not taking insurance at this time. However, I can offer a Superbill so you can apply for reimbursement if you do have insurance. Though I know this may turn potential clients away, I decided to go this route for a few reasons:
Confidentiality
If an insurance company is paying for therapy, they may (and often will) ask for access to the therapist's records so they may determine whether your claims are legitimate. This includes your diagnosis, symptoms, and notes about each session. Though they claim these records will remain confidential, they will allow anyone they deem fit to have access to these records. Because confidentiality is a necessary precondition to therapy, I believe these issues are unacceptable.
Requirement of Diagnosis
In order to cover therapy, insurance companies require clients to receive a diagnosis in order to establish the medical necessity of therapy. The problem is that many that come to counseling need help, but may not experience the prerequisite symptoms that would make a diagnosis valid. Though some therapists choose to work around this, it is legally questionable. Furthermore, I am uncomfortable with introducing dishonesty into work that requires honesty.
Additionally, this means you will have a mental health diagnosis on your record, sometimes permanently. This can result in difficulty obtaining future insurance and/or an inability to obtain coverage for services you need later down the road.
For those that would like to seek reimbursement from their insurance company using a superbill, be aware that a superbill may require a diagnosis based on your insurance provider and whoever is processing your claims.
Length of Treatment
The limited mental health coverage offered by insurance companies runs counter to a simple fact of therapy: it takes time. Though there are more than a few studies showing that brief therapy can help with symptom management, this can be tantamount to taking pain medication for a bone that remains broken. The issues that cause these uncomfortable symptoms
are often entrenched in our personalities and our relationships with ourselves, with others, and with the world. It shouldn't be surprising that such factors cannot be changed in a few months!
Reliability & Return
I have years of experience filing insurance claims, and I can tell you that insurance companies will do everything in their power to avoid paying a claim. Time after time, the counselor and client(s) believe that their sessions will be covered, only for both to later discover that many sessions already held would have to be paid in full by the client. This leads to the clients paying more than they expect and, in many cases, the counselor not receiving what they need to live.
In the interest of honesty, I should be clear about how this affects my bottom line. Even if insurance companies do cover sessions, the returns in Colorado are quite low. The unfortunate reality is that I must be able to afford to live here while also paying off the student loans that allowed me to do this work. This final point is sincerely the least important of the factors, but to brush past this fact would be underhanded.
© 2021 by Green Lion Counseling.