What Insurance Covers

Please note that insurance for mental health is different from physical health coverage. The differences seem subtle and may affect you more strongly. 

Self pay for the evaluation is $195 and for self pay sessions thereafter it is only $170 per 50 minute session. We have a wonderful fully HIPAA compliant, bank- level encrypted system. We take your credit card information at the time of scheduling and charge your card at the time of the appointment. If you would rather pay in cash or check, to save us the credit card fees, that would be great.

For the evaluation, we charge your card at the time of scheduling the evaluation. This helps determine if you are serious about counseling.

Medical insurance does not cover couples/marital counseling because the insurance company says, "it is not a medical issue and therefore it is not medically necessary. Depression and anxiety are examples of what mental health issues are covered by your insurance."

In the past, Don has heard that some counselors would sidestep this regulation about couples counseling and see a couple/family, but tell the insurance company they are seeing one person for depression. The insurance companies were very clear that this is considered insurance fraud. Thank you for not putting Boice Counseling in the position to have to tell you no. Every now and then, there is someone who tells us that their previous counselor committed fraud by doing this, "as a favor" to the client.

The gray area is as follows:
Many people who are separating consider suicide, have thoughts about it or have fleeting thoughts of it. Of course, we recommend counseling and that is covered. In dealing with the depressive symptoms, the idea of marriage or relationship comes up and needs to be resolved. If this is done with an individual, not the couple, and the main focus is depression, not the relationship, then insurance has no problem paying for it. The spouse or partner is allowed to come in from time to time but not regularly. I have always been a rule follower, so I appreciate you respecting that.

I worked with a client whose counselor was raided by the FBI and served time for insurance fraud.