In an ideal world, paying for therapy should be as easy as showing your provincial health card. However, the reality is that access to government funded therapy is rare. Those who do are often limited to a handful of sessions or spend months or years on waitlists. We at Kaizen Therapy believe mental health shouldn’t be a luxury. So, we created our Pay What You Can Therapy Program! Let’s dive into what this program is and why we do it.
What is Pay What You Can Therapy?
Our Pay What You Can Therapy Program is exactly as it sounds. We offer therapy at accessible rates so more people across Canada can access mental health care. Our Pay What You Can Therapist team are student interns in the final step of their master’s program. Our students are Registered Psychotherapists (Qualifying) with the College of Registered Psychotherapists of Ontario (CRPO). They are supervised by senior Registered Psychotherapists who have been practicing for no less than 5 years. In most cases our supporting supervisors have over 10 years of experience.
You are able to choose your price between $35 and $95 and this price is locked in until your intern therapist graduates. At which point, you are free to continue with them at an mutually agreed upon rate or you can transfer to another intern therapist to keep your rate the same.
What issues can an Intern Therapist work with?
Our Interns are able to work with a variety of issues such as:
- Addiction Issues
- Anxiety Disorders
- Autism Spectrum & ADD/ADHD
- Burnout & Stress
- Depression & Grief
- LGBTQ+ Issues
- Life Transitions
- Men’s Issues
- Narcissistic Abuse Recovery
- Relationship Issues
- Self-Esteem
- and much more!
Our intern therapists are also able to work with youth over the age of 10!
Why is affordable therapy so important to us?
I grew up in a lower income family and was not able to access mental health care for most of my youth. It wasn’t until I was working and had insurance benefits that I was able to finally access and afford therapy. With this in mind, we at Kaizen Therapy want to do better. Our mission statement is literally in our name “Kaizen Therapy,” a Japanese term meaning “Good Change” or “Continuous Improvement.”
We aim to produce positive change in the field of mental health by offering highly skilled, accessible, and affordable therapy across Canada. Hopefully one day mental health care will be funded by the government. However, until that day comes, we aim to do our best to offer as many Canadians affordable and accessible therapy as we can.
Is Pay What You Can Therapy less effective?
No. This is not a case of “you get what you pay for.” Our intern therapists are selected to join Kaizen Therapy because of their experience, education, and ability to connect with people. As the co-founder of Kaizen Therapy, the head of our Internship Program, and a practicing therapist myself, I am incredibly picky and hold our students to a high standard. In addition, our intern therapists meet with their supervisors on a weekly basis, participate in professional development workshops, and peer consultations frequently throughout their internship.
If our interns are unable to adequately support you, they will connect you with one of our other therapists who can also offer services on a sliding scale.
Hopefully, this begins to give you an idea of what Pay What You Can Therapy is, how it works, and why it’s a permanent core pillar of our clinic.
To get started, visit our Pay What You Can Therapy page or book a free 30-minute consultation. You can also take a look at our FAQs about Pay What You Can Therapy below.
Frequently Asked Questions
We ask that you reflect on your current financial situation and choose a rate that is within your means. If you can comfortably afford $60 for example, we ask that you choose that rate. Ideally, we want to ensure the program remains sustainable and part of that is relying on clients to choose a price that fits their actual financial situation. We will never ask for proof or question your rate, so there is zero pressure one way or another.
Yes! As long as your insurance covers “psychotherapy” you should have no issue getting reimbursement from your insurance provider. If required, we can also include the name of the therapist’s supervisor on receipts, as that can help ensure your claim is accepted.
Yes. However we do ask that you select a price that works for you at the outset to avoid constant changes. If you need to change your price (lower or higher) simply let your therapist know, and they will confirm the change with the clinic director, who will then lock you into the new price.
