Psych Counseling for uninsured?

December 6, 2006 10:21 AM

I'm trying to help out a friend /wout health insurance who needs some psych counceling in NYC. I remember hearing about something attached to a college, where it was $25 or $50 an hour. Any info?
posted by andrewyakovlev to Health & Fitness (8 answers total)

As always, most psych agencies have some kind of income-based sliding scale available.
posted by IndigoRain at 10:47 AM on December 6, 2006

No info on that program, but... crapsicle! There's a service on the tip of my mind that I saw in West Hartford, CT, but I can't find the name of it to see if it's a nationwide program or not. This was a specific psychiatric group who would trade counseling for community service type stuff. So you'd do a certain number of hours of community service, then you'd get a certain amount of counseling time. This is going to drive me crazy.

If anyone out there's in the West Hartford area, the brochure I saw was in the library, by the entrance/exit doors.

Aside from that, I would check the NY library to see if someone had posted the same or perhaps with the unemployment office, since unemployed folks might not have insurance and need counselling as well.

How was that for next to no help whatsoever?
posted by Moondoggie at 11:32 AM on December 6, 2006

I don't know too much about it, but I know that St. John's University in Queens has a walk-in community psych clinic that is very, very cheap and pretty well regarded.

I'll try to dig up more info on it later today.
posted by saladin at 11:46 AM on December 6, 2006

Okay, so my lovely girlfriend, a graduate student at St. John's Psych Department, has provided me with the following phone number for the school's aforementioned community psych clinic, which she wholeheartedly urges your friend to call:

718-990-1900

According to her, the clinic is sliding scale (sometimes visits are as low as $5 - $10), and the counseling and therapy are top-notch (always supervised).
posted by saladin at 1:31 PM on December 6, 2006

Shit, forgot to include the Web site.
posted by saladin at 1:32 PM on December 6, 2006

Columbia University Center for Educational and Psychological Services is fantastic. Fees range from $0-40 per counseling session, depending on your income and expenses, they have extended evening hours so that you can come in at convenient times, and the counselors and staff are wonderful.
posted by decathecting at 2:17 PM on December 6, 2006

if your friend is 25 or younger, the Youth Counseling League (run by the Jewish board of family services, or something like that) has a sliding scale for people without insurance. I paid 20$ when I was a student. (And you don't need to be Jewish).
posted by illegiblemess at 7:32 AM on December 7, 2006

thank you! this is really gonna help out.
posted by andrewyakovlev at 11:36 AM on December 12, 2006