Why I No Longer Work With Insurance Companies
At Juniper Path Psychology, I believe therapy should be a private, collaborative space where you and your therapist decide what you want to work on, not a process dictated by an insurance company.
After years of working within the insurance system, I made the difficult decision to stop contracting with insurance companies. This was not a decision I made lightly. I know that insurance coverage can make therapy more financially accessible, and I understand that stepping away from insurance can create an additional financial barrier for some people.
But I also came to believe that the insurance model fundamentally conflicts with the kind of therapy I want to provide.
Therapy Should Be About You - Not Your Insurance Company
Insurance companies operate within a medical model. In order for therapy to be covered, there generally needs to be a mental health diagnosis and documentation demonstrating that treatment is medically necessary.
But people seek therapy for many reasons.
You may want to understand yourself better. You may want to work through a difficult transition, improve your relationships, develop stronger boundaries, understand patterns that keep repeating, build self-confidence, explore your identity, or simply become a healthier and more fulfilled version of yourself.
These are meaningful reasons to seek therapy.
I don't believe you should have to be "sick enough" to deserve help.
When insurance is involved, however, the focus can shift from "What would be helpful for this person?" to "Can this treatment be justified as medically necessary?" And that distinction matters.
I want to be able to work with you based on your goals, your values, and what you believe would improve your life, not based on whether an insurance company agrees that your treatment meets its criteria.
Your Privacy Matters
Therapy involves some of the most personal information you will ever share with another person. I believe you deserve to have meaningful control over who has access to that information.
When you use insurance for therapy, your insurance company generally requires information about your treatment in order to process and justify claims. This may include a mental health diagnosis, treatment information, dates of service, and other clinical or billing information.
Even though there are legal protections surrounding health information, using insurance necessarily means that your treatment is no longer entirely between you and your therapist.
For many people, that tradeoff may be worthwhile. For others, it may not be.
Choosing private-pay therapy allows you to make a more intentional decision about keeping your mental health care outside of the insurance system.
We Don't Use AI in Your Therapy
I also have serious concerns about the growing use of artificial intelligence in healthcare and by insurance companies.
I do not use artificial intelligence to analyze, summarize, diagnose, or make clinical decisions about my clients. Your therapy is conducted by a real person, with attention to your individual circumstances, history, goals, and experiences.
I am particularly uncomfortable with the increasing role of AI in decisions involving mental health care, including the use of algorithms and automated systems to evaluate claims, determine coverage, assess medical necessity, or influence treatment decisions.
Mental health is deeply personal and complex. I don't believe an algorithm should determine whether your suffering is legitimate, whether you have received "enough" treatment, or whether the care you and your therapist believe is appropriate meets an insurer's criteria.
Diagnoses Have Consequences
Insurance-based therapy generally requires a diagnosis to support the claim.
A diagnosis can be clinically useful when it helps us understand your symptoms and determine an appropriate treatment approach. But receiving a diagnosis simply because one is required for insurance coverage is a different matter.
Mental health diagnoses become part of your health information and medical record. Depending on your circumstances, that information can have implications beyond your therapy, including when health information is shared with other healthcare providers, insurers, or other entities that are legally permitted to access it.
I don't believe everyone who seeks therapy should automatically need a psychiatric diagnosis simply because they want professional support.
Sometimes you are struggling. Sometimes you are hurting. Sometimes you recognize that something isn't working and want help changing it.
You don't have to have a diagnosis to want your life to be better.
The Administrative Burden Has Become Unsustainable
There is also a practical reality that is difficult to ignore.
Insurance reimbursement for mental health care has increasingly been accompanied by significant administrative demands on therapists. Claims can be denied, delayed, downcoded, or recouped months or even years after services were provided. Providers may face audits, requests for extensive documentation, and demands to justify treatment that was previously authorized or paid.
At the same time, therapists absorb the costs associated with claim submission, billing administration, credentialing, utilization reviews, documentation requirements, and other administrative processes - while reimbursement rates often fail to reflect the time and expertise required to provide high-quality psychological care.
These problems are not simply frustrating for providers. They affect the therapy you receive.
Every hour I spend fighting a denied claim, responding to an audit, correcting an insurance issue, or completing administrative requirements is an hour I am not spending doing what I was trained to do: providing excellent therapeutic care.
There are also longstanding concerns about the enforcement of mental health parity laws and whether insurance companies administer behavioral health benefits in ways that are meaningfully comparable to medical benefits. The cumulative effect has made participation in many insurance networks increasingly difficult to reconcile with sustainable, ethical private practice.
I Chose a Different Model
Stepping away from insurance allows me to make decisions based on clinical judgment and your needs rather than an insurer's requirements.
It means I can spend our time focused on therapy rather than documentation designed primarily for an insurance reviewer.
It means we can discuss your goals without first asking whether they fit neatly into a diagnostic code.
It means your therapy does not have to be shaped around what an insurance company will approve.
And it means I can protect the kind of private, individualized therapeutic relationship that I believe is essential to meaningful psychological work.
This does not mean that therapy is without structure or accountability. I take clinical ethics, documentation, privacy, professional standards, and responsible care very seriously. It simply means that those responsibilities belong to me as your therapist - not to an insurance company determining what your therapy should look like.
What Private Pay Means for You
When you choose to work with Juniper Path Psychology on a private-pay basis, you are choosing a different relationship with therapy.
You are not paying an insurance company to decide whether your treatment is necessary.
You are not required to pursue a diagnosis solely for the purpose of obtaining insurance reimbursement.
You and I can determine what we work on based on your goals and clinical needs.
And you can decide how much personal health information you want to share with your insurance company.
I recognize that private-pay therapy is not financially possible for everyone. This is one of the hardest parts of this decision, and it is something I do not take lightly. I believe, however, that continuing to participate in a system that increasingly conflicts with my professional and ethical values would ultimately compromise the kind of care I want to provide.
My decision to step away from insurance is ultimately a decision to protect the quality, privacy, autonomy, and integrity of the therapy I provide.
If you are looking for therapy because you want to understand yourself, heal from what you've experienced, change patterns that aren't working, strengthen your relationships, or create a life that feels more authentic and fulfilling, you do not need an insurance company's permission to begin that work.
You deserve a therapeutic relationship centered on you.