I have never had a therapist require a doctors note for any of my missed therapy sessions but I do know some therapists that have started adding this to their guidelines amd at the crisis center where I work this is now the rule, also when I went to my last seminar there were many treatment providers considering doing this because of the long waiting lists treatment providers in America now have.

short version is here in the USA we now have a law that says every american must have health insurance that covers the basics of mental physical and dental health. as a result of this law going into affect millions of american's are now able to get the health care they need for their mental problems. the result of this is many is that many mental health agencies are now crammed full and have waiting lists. In order to help all these new clients mental health agencies have to review and set new guidelines for their agency and those that seek help with them. one way to ensure mental health agencies can help all these people is to ensure their therapists are not blocking up their caseload with people who tend to be habitual skippers of sessions.

here at the crisis center where I work we now have a rule saying if you skip more than two appointments due to a health problem then yes a doctors note is needed. that way we know to not place that persons file in the pile of habitual skippers.our clients get notified of this right from their first session so they know from the get go what to expect and if they want to continue to receive services from the crisis center they need to be reliable with their appointments.

granted many people who call saying they have to miss due to illness or doctor appointment may be on the up and up but a huge percentage of the time lost on missed sessions usually if not always turns up to not be an illness, when you think about it how many of us just knew it was going to be a session where we would be working on something we wanted to avoid so we "called in sick" I know I have done it in the past and I know others who have.

this new way of requiring all the clients in an agency to produce a doctors statement is just some agency and treatment providers ways to cut down on the habitual skippers and make room for all those in waiting, without discriminating against any one client...

my suggestion talk with your treatment provider. ask her about this new rule, when it went into affect and whether there are any other new rules you need to be aware of. And maybe ask that if any other new rules come into affect that you be notified, this way you wont get blindsided again like this.