How to pay
This article appeared in There's no question that talk therapy helps. But it's hard work, emotionally speaking, and can be costly: Therapists charge by the session, and insurance reimbursement varies widely.
"A lot of people aren't covered for therapy where they may be covered for the medications," said First, the Columbia psychiatry professor. In our survey, people taking medication were more likely to report that insurance paid more than half the cost than those who opted for talk therapy by itself.
That situation is about to change for many people, thanks to a new federal law, the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act, which takes effect for plan years beginning on or after July 1, 2010. The law says that group health plans that offer mental-health coverage must charge the same co-pays and deductibles, and allow the same number of provider visits, for mental-health and substance-abuse treatment as they do for other medical care. In other words, your plan can't cut you off after 20 therapy visits in a year if it allows unlimited doctor visits for other types of treatment. You'll still have to deal with your plan's normal coverage rules—using only in-network providers, for example. Individual health plans aren't covered by this law, but the national health reform law signed on March 23, 2010, will extend the same mental-health protections to these plans in 2014. A similar parity law for Medicare went into effect in 2010 but won't phase in fully for several years and imposes limits on inpatient treatment.
What to do
If you have a flexible spending account, consider depositing money into it to help defray out-of-pocket therapy costs. If the therapist takes insurance, will he or she submit the claim or will you take care of that chore? If you're paying out of pocket and have a limited income, ask whether the therapist will give you a discount off the regular fee.
