Today we’d like to introduce you to David Zane.
Hi David, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Counseling Associates of Utah was founded to provide the community with a coalition of expert counselors. Each of our counselors has at least 10 years of counseling experience and specialized training in a specific area of specialty. Our coalition of experts’ mission is to address multiple facets of harmful disparity in the mental health arena:
1) Autonomy is the name of the game at our coalition. Counselors can choose their own schedules, offices to work from, the number of clients to see, and which demographics of clients they want to serve. This means that, by removing red tape and geographical restrictions, our counselors’ specialties are often available in multiple locations making our services more accessible to those in need – this plays an especially important role in succeeding in the coalition’s third mission.
2) Counselors – despite the essential role they play in our society’s well-being, are often paid far less than their work merits. As an example, PhD-level practitioners with over 25 years of experience can often find it difficult to make more than $70,000 per year. We created the coalition to provide an avenue for expert counselors to earn $90-$120,000 per year with no more (sometimes far less) effort than they were putting into their previous activities.
3) We provide a better counselor/client fit. Because each of our counselors has years of experience and a dedicated area of specialty, when someone comes to our coalition seeking assistance, for anything, we have a specialist ready to serve them. We do not simply match a client with whoever has an opening. We provide a match based on the client’s needs and the counselor’s area of specialty!
This means that when someone needs help conquering an eating disorder, addiction or depression, or saving/enhancing a relationship – they will NOT get paired with a counselor who fictitiously believes they are great at helping with everything, they will get matched with a counselor who specializes in meeting their specific need.
4) We make ourselves accessible by never have a waiting list, charging less than most specialists, and by accepting virtually every insurance that will accept us. Thus far, in the two years of our service in Salt Lake County (soon expanding to Utah County) we have been able to avoid ever having a wait list, offered tens of thousands of dollars worth of pro-bono services, and accepted clients who had all but given up on finding an office that would take their insurance. We have been able to do this because of the generosity of our counselors – scheduling occasional late night and weekend appointments – and via consistently being able to hire the area’s top talent.
This means that no one who is looking for help must wait 2-8 weeks to get in. In most cases, our coalition can take next day, or even same day, appointments. (We are not equipped to take walk-ins, however.) These four driving forces have allowed our coalition to grow and expand into three offices, serve over 750 patients, and help numerous counselors achieve their professional and financial dreams. We are succeeding and growing in a spirit of cooperation – not competition.
We put the client first in all that we do, but we also protect our staff from overly toxic or dangerous clientele. Essentially, we are doing our best to help as many people as possible, in the most significant ways possible. (As our slogan says, This is Therapy at Its Best!)
These are thoughts off the top of my head – I’m happy to discuss more if necessary.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
- Covid-19, sometimes it is best to be in-person and having to go virtual has inhibited some patients’ recoveries.
- Getting the word to our therapists
- and the never-ending battle with insurance companies to help their policyholders
If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Innovatively addressing mental health needs from the paradigm that mental health needs are as important as physical health needs. We believe life is meant to be lived – not loathed.
What sense is there in living if it’s not purposeful in some way? Thus, mental health is just as important as physical health. Innovating new ways to make the therapeutic process and the mental health industry more effective are our primary goals.
This includes removing the stigma against mental health, therapy, and mental illness. We believe that therapy is beneficial for EVERYONE, and much like physical preventative care, the best time to receive counseling is when you, or your relationship, are well – not ill.
Pricing:
- $135 per session w/o insurance
- Often $0 out of pocket with insurance
- Anywhere in-between depending on the plan
Contact Info:
- Email: connect@counselingassociatesutah.com
- Website: https://www.counselingassociatesutah.com/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CounselingAssociatesUT/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/counseling-associates-of-utah-sandy
