PsiAN Update: Spring/Summer 2026

By Linda Michaels PsyD, MBA 

The fight for psychotherapy is not slowing down, and neither are we. From federal AI policy to ongoing threats to clinicians in independent practice, the months since our last newsletter have brought both urgent challenges and meaningful progress. PsiAN has been active on all fronts, and we are grateful for the community of clinicians, advocates, and patients who stand with us. Please read on for a full update about PsiAN’s recent activities.

A New Resource for Independent Practice

In November 2025, Psychotherapy Action Network launched the Private Practice Hub, a comprehensive resource center built specifically for psychotherapists navigating the complexities of independent practice today. The Hub was developed in direct response to the urgent questions raised by our research on Practice Management Companies (PMCs). How do clinicians navigate this new world where large platforms backed by venture capital investors, tech companies, and insurance companies offer attractive value propositions, but come with hidden costs, privacy problems, and little transparency about who actually owns these platforms?

The Private Practice Hub offers practical guidance on the fundamentals of running an independent practice, from foundational logistics and billing to ethical considerations and strategies for building a practice that reflects your values. There are tools for setting up a private practice independently, and also guidance on how to weigh the risks and benefits of signing up with a PMC.

PsiAN in the Media: Insurance Barriers on the Air

In December 2025, Linda Michaels, PsiAN Co-Founder and Board Chair, was featured in a news segment on KPFA, a community radio station, speaking candidly about how insurance industry practices continue to undermine access to meaningful psychotherapy. The interview offered an important public platform for issues that affect every clinician and patient in our community.

Linda addressed the core problem directly: Insurance companies dramatically underpay therapists compared to other medical professionals, and this disincentive for therapists to accept insurance drives the access crisis in our field. She also spoke about the toll that utilization review decisions, claim denials, and lack of treatment continuity take on both clinicians and the patients who depend on needed treatment.

Standing Up to Unregulated AI: Our FDA Comment

In December 2025, the FDA’s Digital Health Advisory Committee convened to grapple with a question our field cannot ignore: should AI-powered mental health chatbots be regulated as medical devices? For the first time, federal regulators were formally wrestling with the risks of deploying generative AI tools that position themselves as therapists, without clinical evidence, independent oversight, or enforceable accountability.

PsiAN submitted formal public comment to the FDA, urging the agency to take a strong regulatory stance. We expressed concerns that AI tools marketed as therapy, when left unregulated, pose significant risks to individuals seeking help and to the psychotherapy field itself. Because companies developing these tools are profit-driven, they cannot be relied upon to self-regulate; patient safety and clinical efficacy demand more than voluntary commitments.

Federal AI Policy: PsiAN Submits Comments to HHS

In February 2026, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services published a Request for Information asking for public input on how to accelerate the adoption of AI in clinical care. We took this as a call to action.

PsiAN submitted formal comments to HHS urging federal policymakers to put patient safety, privacy, and clinical efficacy first, before deploying AI at scale in healthcare. Our submission raised several critical concerns. There is currently no comprehensive federal regulatory framework governing AI in healthcare, and the privacy gap is severe: many AI chatbots marketed for mental health are not designed with the principles of psychotherapy in mind; they are commercial products meant to make their developers money. They are not HIPAA compliant, meaning patients may unknowingly expose deeply sensitive information without legal protection.

We also objected to the idea that corporate metrics like user engagement or customer satisfaction can substitute for clinical outcome data. We also reaffirmed what decades of psychotherapy research confirms: The therapist-patient relationship is the most powerful predictor of treatment outcome.

PsiAN called on HHS to support independent research, establish uniform national privacy and accountability standards, and await FDA determinations before accelerating AI adoption in clinical care.

Welcoming Two New Advisors

PsiAN is proud to announce two distinguished additions to our Advisory Board!

We welcome Jon G. Allen, Ph.D. and Beverly J. Stoute, MD, DFAPA, DFAACAP, FABP. They are invaluable additions to our community because of their depth of clinical expertise, scholarly accomplishment, and dedication to the kind of care for which PsiAN advocates.

Jon G. Allen, Ph.D.

Jon Allen retired in 2016 after 40 years at The Menninger Clinic, where he served as Clinical Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Baylor College of Medicine. He taught and supervised fellows and residents, conducted psychotherapy and diagnostic consultations, led psycho-educational programs, and directed research on clinical outcomes. In retirement he still teaches, consults, and writes, while holding faculty appointments at the Houston Center for Psychoanalytic Studies and the Institute for Spirituality and Health at the Texas Medical Center. Dr. Allen has written numerous books on trauma, mentalizing, and the therapeutic relationship, (i.e. Trusting in Psychotherapy, Mentalizing in Clinical Practice (with Peter Fonagy and Anthony Bateman), and Restoring Mentalizing in Attachment Relationships: Treating Trauma with Plain Old Therapy. His scholarship represents the human dimensions of healing that PsiAN was founded to protect.

Beverly J. Stoute, MD, DFAPA, DFAACAP, FABP

Beverly Stoute is a child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist and psychoanalyst in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia. A Training and Supervising Analyst at the Emory University Psychoanalytic Institute and a Child and Adolescent Supervising Analyst at The New York Psychoanalytic Institute, Dr. Stoute is an internationally recognized scholar and educator whose work on race, racism, and the therapeutic relationship has shaped psychoanalytic training and practice across the United States and beyond. Her 2023 book, The Trauma of Racism: Lessons from the Therapeutic Encounter, and her award-winning scholarship on racial socialization and psychoanalysis reflect a lifetime commitment to bringing equity and lived experience to the center of mental health care. A Distinguished Fellow of both the American Psychiatric Association and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Dr. Stoute has served in leadership roles at the American Psychoanalytic Association, including as Co-Chair of The Holmes Commission on Racial Equality in American Psychoanalysis. Her presence on our Advisory Board deepens PsiAN’s commitment to equity and parity in mental healthcare, and to ensuring that the therapies we champion are truly accessible to all.

Finally, we are also continuing to grow our volunteer community. If you would like to support our policy or social media work, please drop us a line at [email protected].

Thank you,

Linda Michaels, PsyD MBA
Chair, CoFounder
Psychotherapy Action Network