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Frequently Asked Questions About Therapy and My Practice
To take a virtual tour of the office, please click on the picture below:
1. How much does therapy cost?
The cost of any type of health care depends on what type of services you need and how long you will need care for. My goal is always to help you feel better as quickly as possible. Most of the people I take care of spend between 12-25 sessions working with me on a weekly basis; some take a little longer, some take a little less time. Your individual needs will vary. For a complete listing of the cost of services, including discounted pricing schedules, please see the services page.
2. Do you take insurance?
With the exception of medicare, I do not take insurance. However, many PPOs and HMOs will cover all or a portion of my fee. If you would like to use your insurance, please contact your insurance company and ask what coverage you have to see an "out-of-network provider." They will tell you what your coverage is; if possible, ask them to fax you or email you a copy of your coverage so that you can use this when you submit any documents to them in the future. I will then start to provide care to you, you will pay for the sessions as we go, and once a month I will prepare a superbill for you that you can submit to your insurance company for reimbursement.
3. Why don't you take insurance?
Thank you for asking this. I decided not to work directly with insurance companies for several reasons. The first is that they require me to give you a mental disorder diagnosis; many people that I work with would just like new skills or some different strategies to try at home or work, they do not necessarily have a diagnosis. Secondly, many insurance companies put profound restrictions on what types of services they will cover. For example, many insurance companies do not cover marriage counseling or family counseling. The third reason is that I want you to be actively involved in determining what type of care you are receiving, with insurance, many of your choices and my treatment options are limited. The fourth and most important reason for my not taking insurance is that it severly jeopardizes your confidentiality. If I submit a bill to the insurance companies on your behalf, your confidential information is processed by the insurance company and then stored in a database. Anyone who is involved in the processing or handling of your claim may have access to your records and anyone who has a legitimate reason to access the medical database, such as insurance companies and future employers, can view your confidential records. For all of these reasons, I've decided that I would rather provide care to you at rates that are reduced and comparable to your insurance company's negotiated prices instead of accepting insurance directly.
4. What kind of therapy do you do? How could you help me?
What a great question! In marriage counseling and premarital counseling, I primarily use an approach called emotionally focused couples therapy, also known as EFT. The goal of this approach is to explore your emotional responses to each other, to identify the "cycle" that goes on when things get tough, to change how you respond to your partner, and to initiate new cycles of interaction. The end result is that you will feel closer and more connected to your partner. I use this approach because it really works - research now shows that 70-75% of couples move from distress to recovery and approximately 90% show significant improvements with EFT. This result is much, much better than traditional couples therapy. If you'd like to learn more, please visit http://www.eft.ca/about/about.htm.
With families and individuals, I customize my approach based on individual needs. I use techniques from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), interpersonal therapy (IPT), narrative therapy, and family systems therapy. CBT is a form of psychotherapy that emphasizes the important role of thinking in how we feel and what we do. IPT is a form of psychotherapy in which the focus is on a patient's relationships with peers and family members and the way they see themselves. Narrative therapy is an approach that seeks to help us understand the meanings we assign to a particular chapter, or story, in our life and make sense of it. Family systems therapy looks at the entire family as a complex system having its own language, roles, rules, beliefs, needs, and patterns. Each family member plays a part in the system and family systems therapy helps an individual discover how their family operated, their role in the system, and how it affects them in their current family and in relationships outside the family. All of these approaches are highly effective, brief forms of treatment. If you'd like to learn more, I recommend: http://www.psychologytoday.com/pto/methods.html
5. Tell me about your practice: what kinds of things do you specialize in, what are your success rates, how do these compare to other therapists, and why should I choose you?
I specialize in couples counseling and family counseling. I see approximately 25 clients per week; in addition, I spend about 20 hours a week consulting for corporations. Most therapists see between 15-20 clients per week; I see quite a few more. Of the 25 patient hours I have per week, about 70% are couples, 20% are families, 10% are individuals. My success rates are very good: although I cannot promise or guarantee any result, I'd invite you to take a look at my testimonials page and I can tell you that if all involved are willing to do some work to change and take responsibility for what they're doing to make a situation difficult, there's no limit to what can be achieved! From what I have read, my success rates, 89-93% for all the clients I see, are very high. To read more about the success rates of therapy, please review these links: marriage counseling statistics, Marriage Counseling Success Rates - UCLA Study, and the Consumer Reports Therapy Effectiveness Report. Why should you choose me? Because I can promise to be honest, caring, attentive, and work very hard to help you. Feel free to read more: About Dr. Kathy Nickerson.
6. What are your office hours?
I see clients on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. My first appointment starts at 10am and my last appointment starts at 6pm. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I teach and work with corporate clients. Other times may be available by special arrangement. If you have a difficult schedule, don't worry, just give me a call and we can work something out.
7. Where can I read more about your office policies?
I'm glad you would like to know more about this. To read more about my office policies and practices, please click on the following link: Office Policies and Informed Consent Page
8. Where can I learn more about your background and training?
I am excited you would like to know a little bit more about me, please click this link: About Dr. Kathy to learn more. You can also review my graduate school transcipts by clicking here: Dr. Kathy Nickeron's Transcripts; you can verify my licensure with the California Board of Psychology by clicking here: Verify Dr. Kathy Nickerson's License.
Have a question not answered here? Please email me your question and I will respond just as soon as I can.
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