I text him during business hours usually but email when its outside of business hours so as not to interrupt him, though he never asked. He always gets right back to me and finds a time to talk to address my concerns, which I am grateful for. Text is faster than email, so I will sometimes text at other hours if a need a quick response. We don't carry on with conversations through texts and emails.

I think the emails and texts for work are getting out of hand. I have over 50 coworkers, and where it used to be 100+ emails a day where you could close your laptop and ignore them, it's now daily texting in addition to the emails.

This seems to be a trend with most workers with whom you'd have a long-term working relationship with. I noticed there are general practitioner doctors in the more wealthy areas of my country setting up care packages that allow for services that include unlimited 24/7 email access and sometimes unlimited 24/7 texts personally with the doctor as well for about $200 a month. These packages, for example, also include a dozen appointments per year, 6 Skype meetings, labs, etc. Prices and access are getting more competitive, probably due to technology in part.

I think online therapy is going to add to the competition and brick and mortar therapists are going to have to evolve as competition will grow. This will inevitably mean that electronic communication and evening hours will become the standard. I wouldn't want online therapy, but as other organizations pop up, they may start to develop niche services (eg trauma) and local therapists will face much competition.

In this day and age, it's nearly unthinkable to not offer some type of electronic communication/access. I would allow exceptions for some who don't ever use computers-there are still some people who don't. With these trends, it might be a good idea to start using the "do not disturb" feature on phones so people get a break! I think it can be a problem for burn out, but not for therapists in particular. For everyone. In this day in age, productivity is demanded and people are getting burnt out everywhere (thinking of the US where I live). Sometimes I think electronic communications adds to the burnout, not the productivity. Hmm.