Mental health resources are crucial to employee wellness, with 79% of employees reporting that they are more likely to stay at a company that provides high-quality care and support. However, even as employers increase health benefits to recruit and retain employees, the shortage of providers across the globe remains a significant barrier to accessing high-quality care. 

Limited resources mean provider tracking is spotty at best and often inaccurate. As a result, employees are frequently connected with mental healthcare specialists who aren't taking patients or don't work with insurance providers. 

Many EAPs, health plans, and other mental health solutions tout seemingly impressive networks by provider count and provider-to-employer ratios. However, the American Psychological Association's (APA) 2022 Practitioner Impact Survey revealed that 60% of psychologists in the US reported having no openings for new patients in 2022. 

Modern Health addresses these concerns with an internal global provider network, recruited and curated to include clinical therapists and ICF-certified coaches. Focusing on provider count distracts from whether that network can deliver personalized care quickly to all members who need it without sacrificing quality.

This article explains the importance of high-quality mental health providers and the ways our global network sets our benefits offering apart from the competition.

What’s the Difference Between a Certified Coach and a Therapist? 

When considering the availability of mental care providers, it's essential to understand the difference between coaching and therapy. Even the training and certification process differs. 

Certified Coaches 

A certified coach uses evidence-based approaches to help individuals gain a deeper awareness of a personal challenge they may be facing. They help them identify growth opportunities and create action plans to move toward goals. Coaching addresses non-clinical symptoms like burnout and stress.

Coaches work with individuals to help them elevate performance in a specific area in life. There is no particular degree or license required to practice as a coach. Therefore, providers should have a process for ensuring they are rigorously vetted, certified, and trained in proven approaches. 

Therapists

Therapy is a treatment in which an individual and a licensed therapist work together to understand and address mental health concerns such as anxiety or depression. Anyone can go to therapy whenever they need extra support. It can be benefical if there's a clinical concern, as defined by the duration of symptoms, severity, and interference with social, emotional, or occupational functioning. 

Therapists or psychologists can have a variety of titles (counselors, therapists, clinicians, etc.). They have a master's degree in clinical psychology or a related field and are licensed in the states they practice. Licenses may include Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, and Licensed Professional Counselor.

Take a look at our coaching vs. therapy guide for a more in-depth look at the contrast between the two.

Modern Health’s Global Network of Coaches and Therapists

Modern Health's global provider network has been professionally curated to include clinical therapists and ICF-certified coaches in 60+ countries who speak 50+ languages. We also have psychiatrists and nurse practitioners in the United States to support psychiatric medication management. 

Our entire provider network is built in-house. This means that all therapists and coaches globally undergo the same process for vetting, assessment, onboarding, ongoing quality control, and capacity balancing. 

As a result, we can ensure our network meets these three core needs:

1. Access: Members in each global region access care when they need it the most. Modern Health has a 1-day global average time to the first available session.
2. Quality: All members get the same standard of high-quality care. The average post-session rating for Modern Health providers is 4.9 out of 5.
3. Personalization: The network is capable of meeting the unique needs of every member, inclusive of demographics, geography, and specialization. 98% of specialized match requests receive a same-day match.

Addressing Challenges of Traditional Providers’ Coaching and Therapy Benefits

One of the biggest challenges in accessing mental health support is finding high-quality providers who can offer personalized care quickly. Traditional providers often struggle to meet these standards, with long wait times, poor-quality platforms, and limited care options. Research conducted on eight mental health clinics offering therapy revealed that half of them had longer than three months of wait time. This can decrease utilization rates and make it more difficult for employees to get the help they need.

At Modern Health, we recognize these challenges and have taken steps to address them by building an internal global network of coaches and therapists who are rigorously vetted, trained, and monitored for quality. Our network can deliver personalized care quickly to all members who need it, without sacrificing quality. By investing in the training and development of our providers, we ensure that your employees receive the highest-quality care possible, even in the face of complex challenges like those posed by the mental health industry.

Challenge: Ensuring Accessibility

Many platforms curate an extensive network of external mental health professionals and organizations that participate in a specific mental health plan. However, with no way to view or track external providers, they are often unavailable to meet demands. 

As a result, employees experience long wait times and inefficient scheduling. Without a specific vetting process for mental healthcare professionals and coaches, employees across various regions will likely experience different service levels.

Modern Health addresses these concerns with a real-time monitoring engine ensuring the network matches employees with engaged, responsive providers. Provider calendars are synced with the platform to manage full schedules and maintain time-to-care standards. 

Careful monitoring of our internal network means we can guarantee provider availability within 24 hours and allow members to view and book an appointment in minutes. Since our network is internally sourced, the same standards apply globally.

Challenge: Tracking Quality

When providers partner with external mental health organizations, they have little control over the standards beyond ensuring that therapists are properly licensed within their role. As a result, it's impossible to accurately monitor or develop quality controls for active providers, resulting in inconsistent quality for employees. This also means providers can't accurately supply employers with clinical measures of quality, and underperforming providers go unnoticed. 

Modern Health has developed a consistent and rigorous process for recruiting, vetting, onboarding, and monitoring quality for all global providers. We also have a proven process for monitoring member satisfaction. As a result, members receive the same quality of care globally. 

Challenge: Providing Care Options That Meet Employee Needs

Mental health is not one-size-fits-all. Yet most providers in the mental healthcare field assume that individuals' needs should be met with one-to-one therapy. Members with only one care option are likely to disengage. 

Fewer than half of employees select one-on-one as their preferred mode of care. As a result, many of the employee population are unlikely to adopt benefits with a single mode of care designed specifically for clinical needs.

Modern Health uses an evidence-based model called "stepped care," where individuals are paired with the best modality of care (therapy or otherwise) based on their unique clinical needs and preferences. Members have multiple care options they can engage in simultaneously. 

They can also choose from matches based on demographic preferences, topics of focus, provider specialization, and level of need. This means that members can access care for needs, ranging from preventive to clinical. 

Explore the Benefits of Choosing Care Preferences 

Modern Health is the only provider of mental health employee benefits that systematically considers members' personal preferences in care matching. This approach, in combination with our underlying stepped care model and a network of providers built in-house, makes Modern Health uniquely poised to implement a new standard of patient-centered care within the mental health care industry. 

There's no better time to take action in providing high-quality mental health benefits for employees. Download our study, "The Effectiveness of Evidence-Based Coaching Delivered by Modern Health," to learn more about the benefits of working with a provider that utilizes an internal global network of mental health professionals, including certified coaches.  

‍