mental health billing services
Billing for mental and behavioral health
A behavioral health practice bills time, diagnosis, and often an authorization for the next block of sessions. The note has to support the code, and the claim has to carry the approval number.
Visits we bill
Psychiatric diagnostic evaluations and psychotherapy sessions, including the timed codes practices use for a standard visit and a longer one. When a visit is by video, the note and the claim both have to say so, using the modifier and place of service that payer requires. We do not add a telehealth modifier because the appointment was on a screen if the note describes an in-person exam.
Ongoing therapy often needs a new authorization after a set number of sessions. That count lives on the prior-authorization worklist, not in someone’s memory.
Privacy and the business associate agreement
Psychotherapy notes are sensitive even by medical-record standards. We do not need the full therapy narrative to bill a session. We need the elements the payer uses to adjudicate: the service, the time, the diagnosis, and the medical necessity the plan asks for. Anything beyond that stays in the practice’s record.
We sign a business associate agreement before we handle any patient information. The public website never asks for it. The health check is totals only.
Denials we see
Authorization missing or exhausted. Diagnosis not specific enough for the plan. Telehealth billed as an in-person visit, or the reverse. Timely filing on a claim that waited for a supervision signature. Each of those has a next step. A missing authorization is not fixed by resubmitting the same claim.
See what your billing is leaving behind
Share monthly totals. We will tell you where the gaps are. No patient information.