Confidentiality in Communication

Text messages

Text messages are not secure or confidential means of communication. They’re fine for setting up appointment times and getting directions to my office. For discussing personal information, It’s better to call or use secure, encrypted messaging.

Email messages

Sadly, we all know that emails can be hacked, and that many email providers comb through the content of our emails to figure out what ads to serve us. For this reason, I do not use regular email with my clients – your confidentiality is too important. We may use encrypted email.

Location-based services on phones

If you use location-based services on your mobile phone, please be aware of privacy issues in using these services.  Facebook, for example, has been known to make friend suggestions based on two people’s phones being close together on a regular basis.  GPS data makes it possible that others could know that you are a therapy client at A Good Night’s Sleep / A Vital Life LLC due to regular check-ins at the office on a weekly basis.  Please be aware of this risk to privacy, and for in-person appointments, know that it may be more private to turn off GPS before you reach the office.

By the way, your mapping app may not do a good job of navigating you to my office - there are some issues with both Apple and Google maps in this neighborhood. I will send you directions, so that you can turn off your GPS before you get to the office.

Internet and Social Media

Social Media

I do not accept connections or friend requests over any social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. Social networking sites are not secure or confidential. Since I am on such sites about twice a year, no messages or requests would be seen in a timely fashion.

Business Review Sites (Yelp, Healthgrades, etc.)

I have not added A Good Night’s Sleep / A Vital Life LLC to any business review websites. Many of these sites comb search engines for business listings and automatically add listings regardless of whether the business has added itself to the site. If you should find A Good Night’s Sleep / A Vital Life LLC on any of these sites, please know that such a listing is there without my consent and is NOT a request for a testimonial, rating, or endorsement from you as a client. The American Psychological Association’s Ethics Code states under Principle 5.05 that it is unethical for psychologists to solicit testimonials.
Some of these sites include forums in which users rate their providers and add reviews. If you do choose to write something on a business review site, please be aware that you may be sharing confidential information in a public forum, and that you can increase your privacy and protection by creating a pseudonym that is not linked to your regular email address or friend networks. Due to confidentiality concerns, I will not respond to any review and probably will never see what is written.

Use of Search Engines

It is not a regular part of my practice to search for clients on Facebook, Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, or other search engines.