Email security and therapy

Sure, they should say the real reason. And it might well be that they don't have time, mistrust the communication value of the medium, etc. Not sure that it's about working for free - I offered to pay the one I had a lengthy administrative e-conversation with, and she declined, saying that the issue we were discussing was part of her job, even over email. I don't know how common that would be though.

(Do any therapists out there charge for emails as they do phone calls when they primarily see the client in person?)

I suppose if I were a therapist I'd want calls from those who would otherwise email; it seems like I could help better that way. But sure, I'd say why.

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T and I email back and forth frequently. Honestly I am not really worried about security. T is in private practice and I know she is HUGE on privacy and HIPPA so nobody has access on her end. On my end the only person who could get into my email is hubby but that has never been an issue as we trust each other plus hubby know at least a bit about everything T and I discuss.

I suppose somebody could hack emails and such but I just don't worry about it.

Both my therapists dislike using email to discuss therapeutic matters because of security concerns. I can understand this because the same concerns affect my jobs, which is why both my employers have a (sometimes annoyingly) high standard of email security.

Yet clearly a good many therapists correspond with their clients by email and discuss therapeutic matters. I'm wondering, if you and your therapist do this, how do you deal with the security issue? Is it not a concern for you? Do you use a specific email provider that might have better security (e.g., Gmail to Gmail) or an alternate secure method (e.g., Skype IM is encrypted)? Or are emails less direct than you would actually be in session?

To answer my own questions, while I have emailed with both of them, one was for administrative stuff, nothing sensitive, and the other was a check-in email that was terse: (her) "I just wanted to see how you were after yesterday's session." (me) "Fine, thank you for asking, see you next week." So no therapeutic topics. I plan to keep it that way because I'm more comfortable that way, but wondered how others felt. (Feel free to tell me I'm paranoid!)



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