How to Prepare for Your First Online Therapy Session
First Things First
Prior to starting telehealth, you and your provider will review and sign a Telemental Health Informed Consent document. This document will cover important information about: the risks and benefits of telehealth, confidentiality and its limits, payment of services, the platform you will be using, steps to follow before and during your telehealth session, etc.. This way, you’ll know what to expect, and you’ll be prepared to make the most out of your session.
Before Your First Telemental Health Appointment
Before your first appointment, you will need to identify a private and confidential space where you can hold your telehealth session without being concerned about interruptions or noise. During this preparation stage, you will want to consider if you need a white noise machine or light music playing by your door to prevent sound from traveling. Making sure that you have headphones available to use during your session is yet another way that you can protect your confidentiality. Consider also how you will let housemates, family members, and/or colleagues know that you are unavailable and need uninterrupted time.
Supplies You Will Need
With regular face-to-face counseling, the only things you are responsible for bringing are yourself and your payment. Accessing telemental health services, however, will require you to use certain tools. For telemental health counseling services, you will need the following:
A laptop, computer, or cell phone that has a camera
Headphones
A white noise machine or equipment to play music or white noise if you are concerned about sound traveling
Strong, secure internet connection
Making the Most Out of Your Online Therapy Session
In order to make the most out of your session, you will want to make sure that you are seated in a secure, confidential location that allows you to actively engage in the session. Sitting at a desk or table is ideal. You will want to make sure that your phone and email are turned off and that all browsers (other than your telehealth platform) are closed on your computer.
This will help with internet speed and connection. In general, we want to treat a telehealth session just as you would a face-to-face session. For example, during a face-to-face session, you would not be answering calls, texting, or responding to emails. We want to make sure that you are protecting your telemental health time by engaging in these very same practices.
Keeping It Professional
Although telemental health means being able to access counseling services from the comfort of your own home, it’s important to remember that the nature of this meeting is still a professional one. That means that you want to be wearing the type of clothing that you would generally be wearing if you were attending an in-person counseling session. You also want to make sure that the location you choose for your telehealth session reflects the professional nature of this meeting.
Here’s a Summary of Some Telehealth Do’s and Don’ts
Do:
Identify a confidential location where you will not be overheard or disturbed.
Identify a location that reflects the professional nature of your meeting.
Wear attire that reflects the professional nature of this meeting.
Make sure that you have strong and secure internet access.
Plan to address noise by using headphones and white noise.
Remove all digital assistants (ex. Echo Dot, Google Home, etc.) from your room to avoid having your session accidentally or unknowingly recorded by it. Set your phone to airplane mode to prevent smartphone personal assistants from listening in as well. We like helping you keep your information safe!
Communicate the need for uninterrupted time to the people in your home or office.
Turn off your cell phone, email access, and unnecessary browsers.
Come prepared with the topics that you would like to address with your provider.
Have a great session from the comfort of your own home.
Don’t:
Try to hold a telemental health session from a public place such as a coffee shop.
Engage in a telemental health session using unsecured or public wifi.
Work on other tasks such as cooking, cleaning, texting, emailing, etc. while your telemental health session is in progress.
Drink or use substances before or during your session.
Initiate your telehealth session if you are not fully attired. (I know you might be shaking your head & thinking this is obvious, but it’s here for a reason. 😉)
As you can see, we want to make sure that we’re covering all bases to make sure that you and your provider have an active, engaging, and productive session. After all, this is 60 minutes of your day where you get to focus on nothing other than yourself! We want you to be able to soak that up and make the most of it! We hope you’ll enjoy taking advantage of telemental health services at LifeSpring!
For more information about telemental health at LifeSpring, you can go to our online therapy webpage.
To read more about the clinicians at LifeSpring, click here.
Search Our Other Blogs!
Interested in Online Therapy for Anxiety, Depression, Grief and Loss, or Trauma?
If you’re a Marylander who knows that counseling is the direction you need to take, the therapists at LifeSpring Counseling Services are here to help. We offer online counseling services for mindfulness, depression, anxiety, trauma, and grief and loss. We also offer Brainspotting as a specialized service, and Brainspotting can be done online, too!
Here’s how you can get started! Online therapy for anxiety, depression, grief and loss, and trauma aren’t the only online services offered at our Maryland office
The counselors and social workers at our Maryland office also offer counseling services for trauma, grief and loss, boundary setting, communication skills, and difficult life transitions. We also offer specialized counseling services including Brainspotting and spiritually-integrated counseling. Because we are located next to several local universities, we also work with college students and international students.
Written By: Melissa Wesner, LCPC
Photo credit: Ben Kolde, Rich Tervet, and Stephanie Harvey on Unsplash
Date of Download: 3/20/2020
