Therapy notes are one of the essential parts of any mental, behavioral, and other kinds of healthcare practice as they help providers document patient sessions. They contain important information about a patient’s health (typically mental health) and treatment progress which a healthcare professional derives from documenting or analyzing their interactions with the patient.

Examples of therapy notes may include: 

  • progress notes
  • psychotherapy notes
  • intake notes
  • treatment plans
  • psychological evaluation
  • discharge notes

All this data put together helps practitioners create a better picture of what their patient needs.

This is where therapy notes software comes in handy.

What is therapy notes software and what roles does it have in therapeutic service?

Therapy notes software is a platform that allows mental, behavioral, and other healthcare practitioners to organize, manage, and keep track of all the therapy notes they create during their practice. This way, they can devote their time and attention to where it’s truly needed – taking care of their patients’ mental wellbeing.

Such software solutions aren’t anything new on the market and are a pretty common thing in the medical and other similar/related fields, becoming especially important during the pandemic. However, not all products are equally good (or at all, for that matter), which is why we analyzed the industry to bring you the best therapy notes software solutions your practice can use.

What functionalities should a good therapy notes software provide?

Before we get to these superior products, we first need to establish what it is that they all need to offer in terms of functionalities and features. Having all or most of these features qualifies a platform as a good therapy notes software. The necessary features include:

  • Note management: Practitioners need to be able to create, view, and retrieve notes easily so they could review sessions and make informed decisions about the continuation of their patients’ course of treatment.
  • Templates: A good therapy notes software solution needs to provide note templates for different kinds of specializations, including psychotherapy, behavioral health, and psychiatry. Typically, these templates include click-boxes and drop-down menus. A solution deserves extra points if it allows you to customize your template with additional fields.
  • Coding tools: There are several types of clinical documentation codes, including DSM, CPT, and ICD codes. The best therapy notes solutions allow you to store this information for future retrieval in the note templates.
  • Outcome tracking: If they can turn therapy notes into reports, practitioners will also be able to more easily measure health outcomes across patient groups, helping them do their job faster and more efficiently.
  • Staff management: The best therapy notes software platforms also support assigning roles within the system, such as clinicians, supervisors, billers, office administrators, etc. giving each different levels of access to different data. This feature is especially useful in larger practices.

What is the typical price range/pricing model for therapy notes software?

Different therapy notes solutions can base their pricing models according to specific indicators (either separate or combined), including:

  • type of healthcare providers
  • included functionalities and capabilities
  • number of users within the practice
  • whether the software is an integrated suite or best-of-breed system
  • integrability of the software with other solutions

Usually, opting for a platform of this kind would cost you anywhere between $19 for basic functionality to $549 a month for a full, unlimited suite – depending on the above factors.

Which are the best therapy notes solutions?

As promised, here are the five best software solutions you can use to create, manage, and keep your practice’s therapy notes, excelling in their features and capabilities:

1. vcita

Features: vcita is a full-featured suite of cloud solutions for small and medium businesses, including healthcare (including mental health) practitioners. To users in medical fields, it offers a wide set of features that include:

  • therapy progress notes
  • EHR support
  • online forms
  • online scheduling
  • secure payment processing
  • direct messaging
  • file-sharing
  • clinic management app
  • accessibility on any device
  • custom branding options
  • action button selection
  • marketing options
  • support for individual appointments and group sessions
  • billing and invoicing
  • notifications
  • reminders
  • telehealth
  • integration with Google Analytics and QuickBooks
  • HIPAA compliance
  • mobile device support
  • smart calendar
  • reports

Price: vcita prices its platform according to offered functionalities and capabilities, allowing it to adjust to different practice sizes and needs. For instance, if you only have a one-person team and require only basic functionality, you can start at just $19/month. Basic functionality isn’t available for teams with two users and more, who can begin at the cheapest upgraded plan that costs $65/month. The provider offers a 14-day trial so you can test its platform to the fullest.

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Customer support: Need help? You can try the searchable help center on the website, where you’ll find information about a wide array of issues, ranging from billing to features. If you can’t find an answer there, then the customer support team is the way to go.

User reviews: Customers are generally happy with vcita, its features, customer support, usability, ease of use, customization, and swiftness. Some have reported confusion over the platform’s more complex features, as well as not receiving assistance quickly enough when needed – possibly due to miscommunication in the hectic pandemic times.

Best for: vcita is a versatile platform, suitable for a wide range of small businesses and specializations. The platform as a whole can be deployed by the entire healthcare industry and its therapy notes options are most useful to:

  • psychologists
  • behavioral health practitioners
  • psychiatrists
  • general medicine practitioners
  • life coaches
  • other healthcare professionals

2. NextGen Healthcare

Features:

NextGen Healthcare is a provider of operational, financial, and clinical solutions, combined with a strong patient engagement solution at its core. The platform’s features include:

  • notes
  • EHR integration
  • templates
  • check-in forms
  • regulatory compliance
  • mobile device support
  • patient portal
  • practice management
  • individual and group scheduling
  • prescriptions
  • payment processing

Price: NextGen Healthcare has two pricing modules depending on the size of your practice – small (1-10 physicians) or large (10+ physicians). The plans start at $299/month per practitioner. Free training is included. There’s also a free demo you can arrange with the support team but no free trial.

Customer support: For urgent matters, you can contact the company’s customer service team by phone. If not, then you can submit a customer support case via its Success Community. However, there’s no FAQ or help center on the website.

User reviews: Those who used NextGen’s platform typically praise its basic features, ease of use, customer support, and customization options. However, many were disappointed by the number of technical problems, lagging ICD code updates, lack of integration, and inconsistencies across operating systems and devices.

Best for: NextGen Healthcare supports various healthcare-oriented practices, including physicians and nurse practitioners in a wide range of medical fields, mental health professionals included.

3. Practice Fusion

Features: Practice Fusion is a cloud-based ambulatory EHR platform that offers the usual functionalities, along with a few extras:

  • note templates
  • EHR overview
  • practice management
  • patient portal
  • intake forms
  • e-prescriptions
  • charts
  • cloud-based lab integrations
  • patient engagement
  • billing
  • scheduling
  • reminders
  • ICD-10 support
  • HIPAA compliance
  • reports
  • video chat

Price: Practice Fusion’s pricing depends on the number of providers in a practice, with access to some of the features to additional users. It begins at $149/month per provider. There’s a 14-day free trial on the table, to which you can sign up if you want to test this platform before committing to it.

Customer support: Practice Fusion boasts rich customer support options, including its “unlimited phone, email, and chat support for your entire practice”, help center, video tutorials, live webinars, and updates on new features. And if that wasn’t enough, you can read useful tips and information about the industry on the company’s blog.

User reviews: Reviewers are mostly satisfied with Practice Fusion’s simplicity, ease of use, included features, pricing, and integrations. They did, however, express disappointment in terms of email support efficiency, technical glitches, as well as the lack of mobile support and customization options for mental health practitioners. 

Best for: Practice Fusion focuses on small-size healthcare practitioners across a wide range of professions, mental health included.

4. Therasoft Online

Features: Therasoft is a software platform for psychologists, therapists, and mental health professionals which provides them with helpful features that include:

  • progress notes
  • templates
  • mobile support
  • secure email
  • smart calendar
  • video sessions
  • billing
  • HIPAA compliance
  • payment processing
  • reporting tools

Price: Therasoft opens its pricing at $49/month per therapist. There’s no free trial, but those interested in the platform can sign up for a free demo.

Customer support: If you need help with anything, you can try calling the provider on the phone or send an email.

User reviews: Therasoft Online has solid reviews, with the positive ones focusing on the platform’s ease of use, useful video training sessions, seamless updates, and included features. Some users were disgruntled with poor customer support experience and not getting access to their records after leaving Therasoft unless they paid $200/year. Also, some of the users admitted they needed time to adjust to certain features (e.g. calendar-based system).

Best for: This provider caters to psychologists, psychiatrists, therapists, social workers, and other mental health professionals, including:

  • solo practitioners
  • group practices
  • community services
  • universities

5. Quenza

Features: Quenza is a telemedicine and counseling tool that offers a range of features for mental health professionals, including:

  • progress notes
  • intake forms
  • charts
  • mobile support
  • client app
  • notifications
  • reminders
  • telemedicine
  • premade templates for patient activities
  • feedback forms
  • reports
  • online learning
  • regulatory compliance

Price: Quenza’s pricing starts at $49/month which covers a practice with up to 15 clients, 20 activities, 5 pathways, 250 sent activities/month, 10 premade activities/month, as well as patient notes and chat. There isn’t a free trial per se, but the first month costs only $1, which one can argue is next to nothing. This allows you to test fully whichever plan you want and you can cancel if you don’t want to continue as there are no long-term contracts.

Customer support: Assistance is available in the form of an exhaustive and searchable help center on the website, blog, as well as direct contact via email or online contact form. 

User reviews: Quenza has high reviews across the Internet, mostly praising its clean look, nicely designed interface, handy features, ease of use, customer support speed, and platform improvements. The reviews have had very few complaints, mostly in terms of a slightly high price and having to manually enter session times in the notes.

Best for: Quenza offers digital and automated support to:

  • life coaches
  • therapists
  • mental health practitioners
  • workshop facilitators
  • counselors
  • social workers
  • healthcare professionals