Best Mental Health Software 2020

Discover the best mental health software systems on the market. Use the tools below to grow your practice, save time, and improve your client experience.

Best Mental Health Practice Management Software

Mental health practice management software is the foundational software solution used by counselors, therapists, psychologists, social workers & other professionals to streamline the management of their practices. Practice management software includes tools to improve tasks such as client intake, scheduling, EHR management, and billing & invoicing. Additionally, many solutions offer advanced features such as telehealth and mobile applications.

SimplePractice

SimplePractice

Practice Management System Best Overall PMS
Rating:
Price: $39 per month
SimplePractice, founded in 2012, is SoftwarePundit's best overall practice management system. It features one of the most user-friendly, modern interfaces on the market and has a complete set of features including flexible EHRs, telehealth, and robust mobile applications. Starting at $49 per month for a single clinician, SimplePractice is a reasonably priced high-quality option.
Pros:
  • Well-designed client intake workflow that makes it easy for clients to complete documents
  • Offers Wiley Planners, customizable templates, and ability to create forms from scratch
  • Powerful mobile app with a 4.7 rating on 6,000 reviews, and client app for telehealth
Cons:
  • Does not offer immedate phone support for customers
  • The calendar solution is lacking some nice-to-have features
  • No integrated ePrescribing functionality
CentralReach

CentralReach

Practice Management System
Rating:
Price: Contact Vendor
CentralReach is an outstanding, full solution for behavioral health. Its integrated practice management, clinical, BI, revenue cycle management and HR solutions make it a must-try for any established behavioral health organization that is looking for a comprehensive solution. Two features specific to behavioral health are Chartlytics and CR Institute. Chartlytics is a real-time behavior change tool that allows your therapists to measure behavior, record it visually, and make better decisions. CR Institute is a marketplace with a high volume of free and for-purchase courses to help your behavior analysts succeed with Precision Teaching.
Pros:
  • Built specifically for ABA, occupational therapy, speech therapy and PK-12 special education
  • Excels in data collection, analysis, and visualization
  • Offers Precision Teaching tools and educational content
Cons:
  • The program can be harder to use on mobile
  • Web-based tool can sometimes result in slow or glitchy data
  • Cannot create notifications for expiring employee documents
TheraNest

TheraNest

Practice Management System
Rating:
Price: $38 per month
TheraNest is one of the most popular options in the market, and for good reason. It offers a complete set of features in a modern interface that you can access from any device. In comparison, most other solutions are either lacking key features or more painful to use on a day-to-day basis. A unique differentiator is that TheraNest is priced based upon your number of active clients, and not the size of your team using the system. It is also one of the few systems to offer integrated telehealth.
Pros:
  • Covers all major basic and advanced features including telehealth, and Wiley Practice Planners
  • Wiley Practice Planner subscription includes both Wiley Treatment Planners and Wiley Progress Note Planners with access to over 1,000 pre-written treatments, goals and objectives
  • Option to bulk upload an excel file of multiple clients at once
Cons:
  • Custom forms not fully integrated with other parts of the system
  • Expensive for practices with high volume of clients due to pricing model
  • Scheduling interface slightly confusing for clients
  • Doesn't support eligibility requests
Luminello

Luminello

Practice Management System Best for Psychiatrists
Rating:
Price: $69 per month
Luminello is a practice management system built specifically for psychiatrists, psychiatric nurse practitioners, and therapists. The company has a core tenant to be user-friendly, and it shows. The company offers all the basic functionality you need to run your practice (including e-prescribing in all 50 states), and additional nice to have features including a public profile with built in pre-screen form. It is also reasonably priced at $59 per month. We highly recommend Luminello to psychiatrists that want an easy-to-use, effective practice management system.
Pros:
  • Supports e-prescribing in all 50 states
  • Powerful notes with many time-saving features
  • Partnership with The Carlat Report to view relevant TCR articles and TCR medication fact sheets
Cons:
  • No phone support, sometimes slow responding to email tickets
  • Not a Medicaid certified system
  • Telemedicine is provided through Doxy.me, a third-party solution
TherapyNotes

TherapyNotes

Practice Management System
Rating:
Price: $49 per month
TherapyNotes is a web-based system that works well for practices that benefit from its powerful notes and electronic health records. While these are not customizable, they are created specifically for the behavioral health market and come with auto-suggest functionality that will save your team time and improve data accuracy. Additionally, the billing features that TherapyNotes offers are uniquely strong. When evaluating the system, it's important to keep in mind that these billing features are an extra cost on top of the $59 per month for TherapyNotes' entry group plan.
Pros:
  • Powerful forms with time-saving auto-suggest functionality
  • Robust billing package that offers real-time client insurance eligibility reports for over 900 payers
  • Known for excellent customer service
Cons:
  • Appointments and forms are not customizable
  • Limited patient portal compared to alternatives
  • Telehealth does not support advanced features such as group appointments and screen sharing
Valant

Valant

Practice Management System
Rating:
Price: Contact Vendor
Valant is a tested practice management system that is best for medium to large organizations with psychiatrists at their practices who will benefit from its ePrescribing capability. This solution was built specifically for behavioral health providers, and is equipped with several features that improve operational efficiency including client intake, scheduling, online patient portal, and billing & invoicing.
Pros:
  • Built specifically for behavioral health providers
  • Offers integrated ePrescribing capability
  • Has automatically-generated clinical narratives to save clinician time
Cons:
  • Outdated user interface that does not work with some browsers and is hard to use on mobile
  • Patients cannot schedule appointments through the portal
  • Does not currently offer telehealth functionality
TherapyAppointment

TherapyAppointment

Practice Management System Best Entry Plan
Rating:
Price: $10 per month
TherapyAppointment 2.0 is a good entry-level practice management system with a complete set of basic features including client intake, appointments & scheduling, EHR plans & forms, a client portal and billing & invoicing. TherapyAppointment is used by over 16,000 therapists. Starting at $10 per month, there is no better entry system for brand new practices on a budget.
Pros:
  • Comes with a complete set of practice management features including a strong client portal
  • The company recently released a brand new 2.0 version of the software with an improved user-interface
  • Great entry package: Prices start at $10 per month for up to 10 monthly appointments
Cons:
  • Does not offer more advanced features found in more complex solutions
  • Could be difficult to scale with as your practice grows
  • Their basic forms have not yet been updated for their 2.0 product


Other Top Mental Health Software

There are several mental health solutions that specialize in specific products. Below are three popular solutions that are used for telemedicine, email encryption, and paperless patient intake.

Doxy.me

Doxy.me

Telemedicine Software Best Telemedicine Tool
Rating:
Price: $35 per month
Doxy.me provides a HIPAA and HITECH compliant platform that streamlines the delivery of telemedicine for over 40,000 providers. Doxy.me differentiates from the competition through a focus on reducing cost and complexity. They offer a fully functional free version of the software that is HIPAA compliant and can be used for unlimited sessions. We recommend it for therapists looking to expand into telemedicine who cannot do this through their current practice management systems.
Pros:
  • Seamless experience for both the patient and the provider
  • Abiilty to accept payments and exchange documents
  • Offer completely free, fully functional unlimited plan
Cons:
  • Will be another tool that you need to maintain outside your core practice management system
  • Can only accept credit cards through the system
Vritru

Vritru

Email Encryption Software Best HIPAA Compliant Email
Rating:
Price: $50 per year
Virtru is a well-designed data protection solution that integrates seamlessly into G Suite and Microsoft Outlook to help organizations comply with HIPAA, GDPR and other standards. More than 8,000 companies, including WeWork and HBO, rely on Virtru for encryption of email, Google Drive, and other enterprise applications. Virtru works with companies in the healthcare, finance, government, manufacturing and education industries.
Pros:
  • Integrates seamlessly into your existing Gmail and Outlook workflows
  • Offers a signed Business Associates Agreement for HIPAA compliance
  • Robust data loss prevention policies to scan content for sensitive information
Cons:
  • Does not publish pricing information online
  • Can only encrypt up to 250mb and 10 files at once
  • Content not encrypted locally: anyone with access to your devices can access your data
IntakeQ

IntakeQ

Patient Intake Forms Best Intake Forms
Rating:
Price: $49.90 per month
IntakeQ is excellent at what it does. IntakeQ's Forms Only Package is the best available option focused specifically on client intake. We highly recommend it if you want to solve that specific problem. If you are a smaller, cash-based practice, then we also recommend IntakeQ's Full Package as a practice management system. While it lacks some of the advanced features found in other solutions, it is a super-intuitive, lightweight platform that is adding meaningful new features each quarter.
Pros:
  • Most effective, HIPAA-compliant paperless intake system to reduce paperwork and save time
  • Offers services to build your digital forms from scratch for $9 each
  • Full plan includes appointment management, online payments, telehealth and a secure client portal
Cons:
  • IntakeQ relies on Office Ally to process insurance claims
  • Full product suite does not yet include a mobile application
  • IntakeQ is a general solution focused on delivering value for many verticals
Mend

Mend

Telemedicine Software
Rating:
Price: $49 per month
Mend is a telehealth and engagement platform used by thousands of healthcare providers to conduct telehealth appointments. Its HIPAA compliant video conferencing module is integrated with several features like online forms and appointment reminders that are more commonly found in practice management systems and patient communication software. Other Mend features include appointment scheduling, group telehealth appointments, a secure messaging inbox, and exceptional customer support.
Pros:
  • Entire platform can be customized to your practice's specifications & workflows
  • Provides instant technical support to both patients and providers within 15 seconds to help ensure that visits happen
  • Supports group telehealth appointments
Cons:
  • EHR integration only available with Pro Telehealth Plan
  • Payment processing requires you to sign up for an Authorize.net account
  • Implementation with some EHRs can take up to 5 weeks

Mental Health Software FAQs

Mental health software is built specifically to meet the needs of therapists, psychologists, social workers, counselors, speech-language therapists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, dietitians, and substance-abuse counselors. The software helps these professionals streamline their day-to-day operations, grow their practices and improve patient outcomes. Mental health software is also commonly referred to as behavioral health software.
Although practice management software is the primary tool for day-to-day operations, there are several types of software that mental health professionals utilize. Here's the most popular types of mental health software:
  • Practice management software
  • Patient intake software
  • Telemedicine software
  • HIPAA compliant email marketing
Mental health practice management systems typically start at around $40 for a single clinician. These tools are priced on a per-clinician basis, so a team of 10 counselors or therapists can expect to pay $400 to $500 per month for their subscription. The cost of other types of mental health software varies. Telemedicine solutions start at around $35 for a single clinician. The best paperless forms solutions start at roughly $50 per month.
In terms of practice management systems, SimplePractice is the best mental health software. It is priced similarly to its competitors, and comes with more functionality and a more intuitive user interface. SimplePractice includes advanced features such as telehealth and a mobile application. TheraNest is also a very strong practice management software that we highly recommend exploring.

For teletherapy, Doxy.me is the leading solution on the market. It has millions of users and offers a free subscription that can be used for life. Keep in mind that some practice management systems already include the ability to conduct teletherapy appointments.

The most popular mental health solutions are SimplePractice, Theranest, and TherapyNotes. Each solution has over 60,000 customers.
The most common mental health software features are:
  • Client intake
  • Scheduling
  • Client portal
  • Treatment Plans & Notes
  • Billing & invoicing
  • Telehealth

Mental Health Industry Research & Advice