FAQ

If you have private health insurance with extras cover that includes psychological counselling, you may be eligible for a rebate. For further information, check your insurance policy or contact your insurance provider. Also, please note that you cannot claim from both Medicare and Private Health Insurance for the same consultation.

Our HICAPS terminal can process your private insurance rebate immediately.

Yes. Therapy works best when you feel comfortable and at ease, so it is important that you choose the psychologist that is a good fit for you. You may also like to consider the psychologist’s area of expertise when deciding who to see.

If you have a particular preference for a psychologist please let us know when booking your initial appointment.

The duration of a standard consultation is 50 minutes.

The number of sessions required depends on the person, their difficulties and their goals. Your psychologist will be able to give you an indication of the number of sessions likely to be required after your first consultation.

From your first visit it is important that you feel comfortable and listened to. The first meeting is an opportunity for the psychologist to get to know you better and help you feel relaxed. Your psychologist will ask about your concerns, the reasons you came to see them and your therapy goals. This will allow them to assess how they can best help you.

By the end of the first session, your psychologist can offer some constructive feedback about your presenting concerns and work with you in determining the next steps to meeting your goals.

Seeing a psychologist has been deemed by a number of peak professional bodies (e.g. NICE and the APA) as a preferred and effective treatment for a wide range of emotional and mental health problems. Most treatment studies over the last 40 years show that people receiving psychological therapy are better off than 80% of those who don’t. For the scientifically-minded, learn more about psychotherapy effectiveness here. Therefore, while we can’t guarantee success for every single person, research suggests psychological therapy is very likely to be effective for you.

Information that you provide to a psychologist is treated as strictly confidential. The only exception to this is when: You are at serious risk of harm to yourself or another person A court subpoenas information from the psychologist You have provided consent for the psychologist to release your personal information. For example, to communicate with: a GP as part of a Mental Health Treatment Plan lawyer school staff some other relevant individual, organisation or agency For young people under the age of 18, there are additional exceptions to confidentiality, including: The disclosure of any form of child abuse The disclosure of self-harm behaviour or suicidal thoughts or plans Psychologists must strictly adhere to legislative and professional boundaries. The Australian Psychological Society (APS) sets out the Ethical standards that guide professional behaviour. Details on this can be found in the APS Code of Ethics .