How Can Therapists Accept (and Impact) Technology?: An interview with Dr. David Cooper
Curt and Katie chat with Dr. David Cooper of Therapists in Tech to explore the evolving role of artificial intelligence (AI) in therapy. Dr. Cooper highlights the importance of tech literacy, privacy, and security in digital mental health while advocating for therapists to use AI as a tool for efficiency rather than replacement. He compares this shift to the transition from paper charts to electronic health records (EHRs) and encourages therapists to stay informed and engaged through communities like Therapists in Tech and the Society for Digital Mental Health.
Click here to scroll to the podcast transcript.Transcript
(Show notes provided in collaboration with Otter.ai and ChatGPT.)
An Interview with David Cooper, PsyD
David Cooper, PsyD. is a digital health expert who is the current Executive Director of Therapists in Tech, the largest organization of clinicians in digital mental health – and an inaugural member of the APA’s Mental Health Tech Advisory Committee. With a background in clinical psychology, David has led the development, management, and implementation of digital health solutions, with organizations like the US Department of Defense, the AMA and FDA, and top US hospitals on their digital health strategies and portfolios. Currently, he focuses on helping companies and organizations integrate technology into the practice of therapy and treatment.
In this podcast episode, we talk about how therapists can engage with technology
At the Behavioral Tech Conference, Katie met Dr. David Cooper of therapists in tech. We invited him on to help us understand better how therapists can engage with technology safely and ethically. As AI continues to integrate into mental health care, therapists must embrace innovation while advocating for ethical, client-centered practices.
How can therapists engage with AI and digital health responsibly?
“The more likely outcome of AI is not as a replacement, but as a[n] augmentation.” – Dr. David Cooper
- Use AI tools like ChatGPT for administrative efficiency and tech troubleshooting.
- Advocate for digital health education in graduate training programs.
- Seek guidance from digital health experts through groups like Therapists in Tech.
- Implement technology for administrative tasks, such as automated reminders and billing.
- Stay informed and connected with digital mental health advancements through professional communities.
Key Takeaways from this podcast interview with Dr. David Cooper of Therapists in Tech
“[We need to advocate for] humans at the heart of care, whether that is the therapist or the patient; tech is a tool to facilitate that connection, is a tool to support those folks, not to replace them or shortcut it.” – Dr. David Cooper
- AI can enhance, not replace, therapy, improving efficiency in practice management.
- Ethical considerations remain crucial, especially regarding privacy and data security.
- Tech literacy is a necessary skill for all therapists as the field evolves.
- Therapists should take an active role in digital health advocacy to maintain the human element in care.
Resources for Therapists Adapting to Digital Health:
- Therapists in Tech – A community for professionals navigating digital mental health.
- Society for Digital Mental Health – A resource hub for therapists exploring tech solutions.
- Behavioral Health Tech Conference – A key event for learning and networking in digital health.
Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode:
We’ve pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance!
Society for Digital Mental Health
David Cooper on LinkedIn
Behavioral Health Tech Conference
Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast:
Reporting Back from the Behavioral Health Tech 2024 Conference
AI Therapy is Already Here: An interview with Dr. Ben Caldwell
The Advances in Artificial Intelligence for Mental Health: An interview with Dr. Alyssa Dietz
Is AI Really Ready for Therapists? An interview with Dr. Maelisa McCaffrey
Is AI Smart for Your Therapy Practice? The ethics of artificial intelligence in therapy
Is Artificial Intelligence Bringing Bias into Mental Health Treatment?
The Future Is Now: Chatbots are Replacing Mental Health Workers
Revisiting SEO and AI – Ethics and best practices: An Interview with Danica Wolf
Topic: Artificial Intelligence
Who we are:
Curt Widhalm, LMFT
Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making “dad jokes” and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: http://www.curtwidhalm.com
Katie Vernoy, LMFT
Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt’s youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: http://www.katievernoy.com
A Quick Note:
Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We’re working on it.
Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren’t trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don’t want to, but hey.
Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement:
Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy:
Connect with the Modern Therapist Community:
Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group
Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide Creative Credits:
Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/
Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/
Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated):
Transcripts do not include advertisements just a reference to the advertising break (as such timing does not account for advertisements).
… 0:00
(Opening Advertisement)
Announcer 0:00
You’re listening to the Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide, where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.
Curt Widhalm 0:12
Welcome back, modern therapists. This is the modern therapist Survival Guide. I’m Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy, and this is the podcast for therapists about the things that go on in our world, the things that happen in the therapy profession. And Katie and I have been talking a lot about artificial intelligence and how that’s coming into the mental health space. We had an episode where we kind of reviewed Katie’s trip to the Behavioral Health Tech Conference, and she made a lot of friends there, and people who are able to help us be able to kind of further on some of the conversations. And I would not by any means call Katie and myself experts in artificial intelligence, mental health, sorts of stuff, the digital health space. We’re aficionados, maybe, we’re enthusiasts, as far as this goes, but people who are more in those expertise roles are people like our guest, Dr. David Cooper from Therapists in Tech. So thank you very much for joining us and helping us to further along this conversation.
Dr. David Cooper 0:23
Also happy to be here. Thank you so much for having me. And yes, I love the Behavioral Health Tech Conference too, Katie. I call it a chance to get see my internet friends. It’s only people I see on Slack or LinkedIn. I get a chance to hang out with them for three days. It’s great.
Katie Vernoy 1:30
That was my first time, and I was really I felt like I was drinking from a fire hose, and so I was very excited when you said that you would come on the podcast and maybe help us understand what’s going on in the world. But before we jump into that conversation, I’m gonna ask you the question we ask all of our guests, which is, who are you and what are you putting out into the world?
Dr. David Cooper 1:49
Great place to start. So I’m David Cooper. I am a psychologist first, and digital health expert second. My focus has been on throughout my career of building technology tools that help mental health, helping companies commercialize that. So from a product and strategy perspective, it’s kind of what I’ve been doing for the past over a decade. Now, currently, one of the things I lead is Therapists in Tech that we set up at the top that again, helps psychologists become more informed about these kind of things, and it’s really a space for clinically trained people who want to get into digital health and want to learn more. It’s a Slack group. We trade How Tos, how do you actually do any of this stuff on a day to day basis? But between Therapists in Tech and groups like the Society for Digital Mental Health, I think we’re really starting to turn a corner in helping psychologists adapt and embrace this new digital world.
Curt Widhalm 2:45
Katie and I are both part of the California Association for Marriage and Family Therapist’s ethics committee, and amongst some of the work that we are doing on that committee is hopefully helping to update our ethical standards for what it means for digital mental health, and in particular, a lot of the role play with artificial intelligence. One of the questions that we seemingly come across a lot in our discussions about what we’re hoping to put out there is, by and large, a lot of mental health professionals are digital immigrants. They’re people who’ve been around the world for a very long time. I’m trying to find nice ways to say it’s a profession that’s got some people with a lot of years of experience. What are some of the things that we’re seeing in this transition to a more digital space that might be some errors that are happening for people who either don’t understand some of the technology, or, on the other end of things, some of the digital natives out there who are jumping in real quick, and what are some of the things that we’re seeing out there? So that way we can hopefully help our audience not make some of those same mistakes.
Dr. David Cooper 3:57
Absolutely no, it’s so funny. That was one of the things that got me started was just thinking, Man, I wish there were people in my field smarter about this stuff. I think there’s a lot of good we could do. And sadly, I think, yeah, sometimes the stereotype is a little bit true of we’re definitely more scarves and candles than beeps and boops. This profession is definitely much more of the ways that we go. I think to start off maybe kind of with the ethical stuff. One of the things I do is help the APA advocate and navigate some of this world. They have a mental health tech advisory panel that I’m a part of, and that’s something we’ve talked about a lot on the panel, and are really trying to come out with guidelines for folks. I think one of the beneficial parts of this is, I don’t think we necessarily need new ethical guidelines, so much as, how do we apply the ethical concepts that we’re already familiar with to this new landscape, right? So when we think about technology, like a good thing to think about is privacy, security, right? Like those are part of our ethical frameworks. Okay, I’m not storing my files in a locked cabinet anymore. I’m storing them online in the EHR or something like that. What do I need to know to be able to educate myself, to know that this is secure to a reasonable level, and to kind of understand that, and I think that’s a thing that we can do more is provide, again, therapist’s guidelines for these kind of things. And maybe to jump the gun a little bit, I think that’s a place where AI can be very helpful. One of the things I’m trying to get therapists to do is use AI more and just be familiar with it a little bit more, maybe not necessarily for patient work, but just, hey, this is going to be an important part of our work, just as people, not necessarily as therapists. I think just in general, this is going to be an important thing going forward. It feels like a little bit like, you know, it’s 1997 and we’re talking about the internet, right, like you can kind of feel there’s something there, even if I don’t know how I’m going to use it, or how this stuff is going to work, or websites, right? Like in the early aughts, I was talking to a group of academic deans, and I was like, it’s kind of like a website, right? Like you don’t need a website to be a therapist, but being able to use and have a website makes you get more clients, makes the job easier. And that’s, I think, a good analogy for AI. So going to something like ChatGPT and asking, Hey, I’m a therapist, what do I need to know about keeping my data secure? See what it tells you. That’s how I use it a lot more is to help solve, like, my own technical issues, or maybe in place of a Google search, like it gives me a little bit more of a structured answer, or asking, Where can I go for some of this more information? I think that is a good kind of way to help both on the ethical side and kind of demystify descarify technology a little bit.
Katie Vernoy 6:52
It seems like as therapists are becoming more digitally aware and EHRs, most folks seem to have them. I know there are still folks putting, you know, paper charts in a file and locking it, but I think that, in truth, there’s a lot of misinformation. There’s a lot of panic and fear about: What does it mean if I do this? What’s ethical? What’s not ethical? We started talking about that, but really it feels like the fear is overriding the messaging for at least a subset of therapists around what is okay to use. And maybe we can talk about that a little bit, because I think there’s a lot of therapists who are saying absolutely not to AI for any reason. There are folks who are wanting to push back on any digital solutions that might support their work, because it’s going to ruin our profession. And so to me, I think there’s this necessity to really understand it differently, and also to be aware because there are some bad actors, and there are some things that are risks and a threat to our profession.
Dr. David Cooper 8:04
Absolutely. That was gonna be the first response is: those fears are not unwarranted. I don’t want to dismiss those, right like there are very good reasons to be concerned about this. And again, as therapists, this is stuff, maybe that’s kind of the framing I want to use, going forward, as therapists this is all the stuff we’re familiar with dealing with from the get go. I guess, positively or negatively, it’s not a new fight. It’s the same old fight that we’ve had going on, because our health care system is a capitalist focused system, so everyone is going to try to maximize profit at the expense of maybe care or what’s right for the patient. That’s always a tension I think every therapist is familiar with. And again, these kind of issues with technology are ones that we’ve had before. There were people that resisted the telephone, there were people that resisted doing teletherapy or having a website or Microsoft Word. Again, I think these are all things that we’ve had before. We just maybe haven’t faced them in our generation yet. So we have to kind of go back and see, like, how did we deal with this stuff at the rise of teletherapy? Well, we educated about what it was about. We had people use it, try out the risks, the pros and cons. And it took us 5-10, years, 15-20, years, to figure this stuff out and get to a place where it’s in a good place. Again, I know when I was starting my career, I was like, Okay, I’m gonna be building apps. I’m gonna be the good scientist practitioner, and I’m gonna go read, you know, been a couple of years now, I’m sure there’s research on apps. And this was like, 2012 oh, there’s gotta be stuff out there. It’s nothing. It was all researcher on like texting from the early 2000s so it takes our field a while to kind of deal with this stuff, and maybe that’s some of the urgency and fear kind of creeping into it. Again, why, I think approaching it with a spirit of curiosity and how this can be helpful and play not that all of us have enough time forplay. We got jobs and like, building in times to tinker, like, again, talking to psychologists. They love tinkering around with tech tools, right? Like some of us do, but the majority of us are maybe in the scarves and candles camp less than the beeps and boops, right? But finding time to be honest, like this is where we know it’s headed. How do I use this? How do I bring this in in a way that’s safe, accommodating and educating yourself? And again, hopefully just playing with some of this tech and figuring it out. I think we are all capable of it. I think it’s things that we’ve done before, but just coming together and figuring it out as a whole is where we’re going.
Katie Vernoy 10:35
I wonder if the telehealth transition would have actually been so quickly implemented, if not for the pandemic. I mean, I feel like there has been a force of you must move into this different space. And there were still some folks who stayed in person and masked and or didn’t and resisted that transition. But it feels like it was forced upon us, and so we were forced to adapt. And I wonder if potentially, there’s trauma from that, but also that there’s this element of outside forces like VCs or insurance companies or whatever, are going to force this next digital transition as well.
Dr. David Cooper 11:20
Yeah, inside the digital health field, we talk about COVID being like 10 years crammed into like two, right? Like 10 years of advancement. And I think, I think you’re right. I think it’s something I’ve been thinking about just personally with the field and where we are and where things are in the world. And I think part of it is again, let’s, you know, therapist, heal thyself. Let’s use our own skills on ourselves and come to a place of acceptance. You’re right, until larger things are gonna change. And I hope there are people in our field who advocate for a better healthcare system that is more equitable to patients, therapists and all that stuff, and maybe not so financially driven. I hope and pray that those people are out there and wish them all the success. But in the meantime, there’s the system that we have. I say that sometimes, like, you can work on the system, or you can work in the system. And so if I’m a person who is working in the system, how do I accept and acknowledge that, yes, this is sort of an inevitability, and how do I come to terms with that? And processing grief about this is not the way I wish the field would go, and this is different. Is a first part of that acceptance process. But sounds very, man, we are a bunch of therapists. I’m using all kinds of very heavily emotion leded language. I don’t mean like horrible grief, but yeah, we deal with that every day. The world doesn’t always turn out the way we want it to be. So how do we accept and adapt? And part of that is just, hey, tech, literacy is just something we all have to get better about, no matter if we’re a therapist, a plumber, what have you. It’s just increasingly an important part of everybody’s world.
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Curt Widhalm 12:59
When you are talking about literacy and you are talking about people working within the system, there’s got to be a minimal level of competence that we expect people to bring. Where is that competence level at? I mean, for some of the people that have been practicing for decades and decades that masked up during the pandemic, who might be working in these systems might be insurance companies adapting into these systems that are looking at, hey, you have to learn these new tools and to be able to use them and don’t have the time. Are they facing retirement that’s kind of being forced and pushed out of the system, now?
Dr. David Cooper 13:37
I don’t want to say absolutely not, because, let’s be honest, that maybe a thing. I don’t think it’s necessarily forced retirement. Is it going to be as let me go back to the website analogy, right? Like, can you be a therapist today without a website? Absolutely. You can get clients, and you can have an office, and you can see all that stuff. Does it make it a whole hell of a lot easier to be a therapist if you’ve got a website where people know how to reach you and can book appointments and do all that stuff? Yeah. So I think that is the frame I want to put the tech stuff in. Is it absolutely necessary? I hope not, but it does make things a heck of a lot easier when you kind of know the waters that you’re swimming in and know where to go. I think absolutely we need to do more about education for some of this stuff. That’s one of the things I want to try tackling with Therapists in Tech and some of these other groups, is, how do we do continuing education credits for all of the things that we were never taught in grad school that are now part of our jobs. How do we bring that back into training programs without making it more onerous on training directors and giving them one more thing to do, right? Because how many of us were taught about being entrepreneurs and running our own businesses and all that stuff? Same kind of stuff with tech. I think, sadly, it’s just one of those things that is part and parcel of the job that we have to do, and we have to do a better job of training. But also, if you embrace tech, there has never been a better time to teach yourself how to do any of this stuff. I am a proud graduate of YouTube University of so many things. So I think if you can embrace it and find the right tools, there’s never been a better time to quickly get up to speed on all this stuff, like understanding HIPAA and navigating telehealth platforms and all that kind of stuff.
Katie Vernoy 15:32
Is there a basic level of knowledge that you think is best practice, maybe for clinicians?
Dr. David Cooper 15:39
I think it starts at the foundations of just knowing, again, privacy regulations, HIPAA, how they apply to telehealth platforms. Because, again, we can extrapolate the same kind of stuff for AI or any other tool out there, right? What’s the core principles? What are the core fundamentals that we need to know? And then take that critical lens to the next tool. So great. I know how telehealth platforms work. I know what I need to be secure for teletherapy. How does that apply to AI? Well, okay, I need to understand how they work. I need to understand how the data is stored. Who can see that data? Who can use that data? Do they have a BAA business agreement that they can sign that’s HIPAA compliant? Can they take some of the burden on securing this stuff? Clearly communicating with our patients, right, Hey, we’re going to be using a telehealth platform. This is the platform we’re using this AI tool. This is how it works. This is who can see the data. This is who can’t see the data. We should know that as therapists, and we should demand that from the people providing these tools, right? If I am going to pay Zoom to be able to use them for teletherapy, because they have a HIPAA compliant version. Hey, if you want me to use your AI tool, I need you to tell me and give me the checklist that it’s HIPAA compliant and secure and all these things before I’m going to give you any kind of money.
Curt Widhalm 16:56
Some of the conversations that we’ve seen in this space are a lot of fear. A lot of the tech companies move way faster than what our research does and what the application of our research does. There’s a lot of fear that in things like the telehealth systems monitoring our sessions and training AI bots to take over our jobs and ideas about what HIPAA is, rather than what HIPAA actually is when it comes to patient data. So I teach law and ethics, I teach about HIPAA, I teach these things. I don’t know that this is about a lack of opportunities for some of this education. Where do you see the really big gap at that mistrust coming from when it comes to therapists approaching this kind of a novel aspect to the way that we do our work?
Dr. David Cooper 17:52
Ooh, I have so many thoughts on that. I think one, I think it is our own biases as people about what is and what is not, likely. To kind of go back, maybe this will resonate with you, Curt or go back to the ethics class. I remember when I was getting educated ethics, they were going around, and everyone was saying, what are the most concerning part of the ethical code for you? Like, what is the thing that? And I raised my hand, I was like, sleeping with patients. And everyone was like, Oh my gosh. And I was like, not that I think I’m gonna do it, but that is the thing that most psychologists get dinged for in ethical complaints, and none of them thought they were gonna do it either. So yes, I want to focus on statistically, what’s the most likely. And again, I think that’s where some of that fear is right. There are companies out there that advertise AI bots as replacing therapists. That does exist. So that fear is absolutely justified, and I think it comes from that lack of familiarity and understanding that the more likely outcome of AI is not as a replacement, but as a augmentation. There’s a writer I really like, Corey Doctorow, who talks about AI as centaurs, right where we’re people on top being driven by this horse of technology. And I think if that’s the lens you can kind of approach it with of, how does this make my life easier? How does this make my life better? How does this take all of the stuff that’s not therapy off of my plate? I think that is going to be the more likely outcome, not that we’re not going to try and get replaced. And sure that’s also going to happen. But in the end, I think people want to talk to people rather than, you know, maybe that’s my foolish, naive bias. But you know, I think you want to have people talk to people. So then I asked myself, okay, how does this help me talk to people more? How do I carve out the things that I can do that tech can’t? Like let tech be tech and let tech do the tech things. Let me figure out what’s my space of all the creativity and joy and expression and emotion, empathetic communication and connection that tech can’t do, and how do I focus on doing more of that?
Katie Vernoy 20:12
So shifting gears a little bit, because I think we’ll end up having a lot of this same conversation of, why are therapists hesitant? What should they push back against, and all those things. And I want to honor that you have a group called Therapists in Tech. And so if someone is saying, Yes, I love the centaur idea. I love the idea that tech will make me a stronger therapist, or make my life better, or however they view it, I think Curt and I are starting to move into that camp with more exploration. Although there’s still part of me that’s like, Uh-Oh, what is it all going to look like? But if a therapist is actually saying, Ooh, this is exciting, this is something that I want to be involved in. So not just the bare minimum of competency, but I want to actually impact this new area in the profession. What are your recommendations?
Dr. David Cooper 21:03
A: My recommendation is, keep some of that. Ahh, keep some of that. Ahh, skepticism, right? Like, don’t jump in with both feet. Keep some skepticism.
Katie Vernoy 21:12
Excellent.
Dr. David Cooper 21:13
I think increasingly, there are great number of groups that folks can join, Therapists in Tech is one. Again, we’re clinically trained only folks. There is the Society for Digital Mental Health that’s much more research and academically focused. There is Digital Medicine Society, which is sort of larger digital therapeutics and tech focused. There is no shortage of groups coming together. So finding one of those larger groups to join is great. If you live in an area where there are tech meetups or a school, a university system nearby, that can be a great way to get involved. I do a lot here in Seattle with the University of Washington, we have regular digital health get togethers where all of the people in Seattle working in digital health come together and talk about things, everything from developers to, you know, CEOs and everybody in between. And so you can really sort of dip your toe into the waters of figuring out what’s going on. And I hope the audience does want to get involved. Because, again, I think this is a thing. You know, early in my career, I had that conversation a lot about, is this a thing? When this was when we were building apps for mental health, right? Like just doing apps, there was a lot of conversations about, should we be doing this? And I was like, gang, the conversation is done. The barn is burnt, the horse is gone. It’s not whether or not we should do it. It’s gonna happen. The question is whether or not we have a seat at the table while it’s happening. And we can move some of this and change how some of this goes. Again, I can come back to that place of acceptance of AI in tech of you can rail against it. You can kind of be anti tech, and I think there is certainly a place for that, but for most of us, it’s going to be an inevitability. So let’s figure out on how we do this, rather than whether or not we should. Because again, I think, sadly, money talks in our healthcare system, and that’s where the money wants to go.
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Curt Widhalm 23:16
So I’ve been using the metaphor the toothpaste is out of the tube. That the getting tech out of mental health space is that was gone way before the pandemic. That’s a waste of time and energy at this point. Part of the other conversation that we normally have on this is with people entering into the workforce, even just being able to get some of this education in there, is that something that Therapists in Tech are also looking at doing is influencing how this is showing up even in grad schools, because it seems like even some of the grad students that we’re talking to, this is something that professors are lightly mentioning in the wind. It’s the La Croix flavor of it’s a flavor in the next room, as far as discussion.
Dr. David Cooper 24:00
I love it. La Croix flavored education. I’m gonna steal that one. No, that’s perfect. Yes, we have a number of grad students in Therapists in Tech. We run mentoring programs where we pair people up. I talk to a number of grad students. Anybody who wants me to come talk to their students on Zoom, let me know. I’m happy to. I talk to students all the time, because this is not a competency folks have. And you’re right, Curt, I don’t know if I have an answer, but I see the La Croix flavored education of it, of trying to educate students about tech when nobody in a graduate training program has even worked in tech, right? It’s like trying to teach them how to do therapy when nobody’s been a therapist. I think that is a thing a lot of training directors and graduate programs are going to have to kind of deal with. I hope that more of them reach out to those of us who been working in the industry and figure out how to bring us in, because a lot of us still want to share that expertise and talk with students. It was really great. I know University of Washington had me come, um, early in 2024 and talk to their grad students. And we were able to have a really great and frank, honest conversation, which was me and a couple other folks working in the field of: Hi! This is what we do. This is how much we make. This is how we got to where we are. This is how it works. Because I feel like, without that, academia feels like it’s like two cycles away from falling over when nobody decides they want to be a postdoc anymore and move on into industry. So I hope we can figure out how to get off the tiger that we’re riding in academia, trying to keep that plugging along, and again, help those new grads. And again, the groups I mentioned, tons of graduate students in them. There’s tons of us in the field who always want to talk with folks, and we’ll give you at least 30 minute call of just, hey, this is how we did it. This is what you can do. I know I do it all the time. I know my peers do it as well.
Katie Vernoy 25:53
Curt and I both have been involved in our professional association and other activities of advocacy, and I know that that’s been another piece of movement around tech for therapists, and a lot of it’s coming from a place of lack of knowledge. Some folks are very knowledgeable and very anti tech. So you know, potentially, we’ll have somebody on talking about those things as well. But for someone who’s in the positive realm of trying to positively impact tech and make sure that the way things develop are very positive, I think that there’s a need to understand, what do we accept and what don’t we accept? Where do we place our advocacy efforts effectively with the knowledge of the state of tech right now in our profession?
Dr. David Cooper 26:43
I mean, I don’t necessarily want to say the U word, but I don’t know, unionizing right? That might be where we’re heading. No, because I think it is. Again, if I have to give like a guiding principle is advocating for the humans at the heart of care, whether that is the therapist or the patient Tech is a tool to facilitate that connection. Is a tool to support those folks, not to replace them or shortcut it, or min max healthcare so that we can, you know, do the most like make it just cut down to the barest bone of most efficient, right? I think that is where we have to be advocates for is both for ourselves and our patients, to be at the human core of this, whether that means, you know, better pay, pushing back against insurance companies on reducing payouts for therapists, figuring out how to incorporate some of this stuff, naming and shaming. There’s companies, you know, I’ve called out to FTC and FDA for, you know, deceptive practices. I remember there was one that was advertising, you know, depression gone forever. And I was like, you can’t say that. Like, that’s not a thing you can say. So pushing back and calling out bad behavior when we see it, I think, is an important place for us. And again, advocating for that human connection. You don’t necessarily have to be again, anti tech. It doesn’t have to be everything tech is bad. But we need to say, Hey, these are no go. These are the boundaries that we draw to say, you know, beyond this, that’s too far. But let’s figure out how to use tech and how to have it be that augmentation tool without it being a replacement or a shortcut if you’re reducing that human element in therapy.
Curt Widhalm 28:29
It would seem like the people who are saying ‘we’re not training your replacements,’ would be the exact kind of people that would be training their replacements.
Dr. David Cooper 28:40
I mean, that’s fair. I think that’s a fair criticism.
Curt Widhalm 28:45
But I think it’s also helpful to kind of point out in these conversations that, you know, the widespread application of the calculator did not take away our responsibility for things like mathematics that…
Dr. David Cooper 28:58
Yeah.
Curt Widhalm 28:59
…this is looking as you keep pointing out about how this is augmenting treatment and the benefits when done correctly, look for better patient care. I mean, even things as simple as I love how much my no show rates dropped when automatic appointment reminders went out to patients. The amount of admin time that’s gone down by emphasizing that super bills just get automatically put out through my EHR. Like these are great things that tech has already done that I was not an early adopter, and wish that I had started my practice with some of these things. I think some of this is finding that balance of healthy skepticism and being able to wade into it rather than diving face first into it.
Dr. David Cooper 29:48
Yes, there is a quote from a fellow named Alan Kay I’ve been using, I think, since the start of my career, which is technology is only technology if it was invented after you were born. I think too many of us forget that, right? Hey, at one point, the horse and buggy was the height of technology, right? We just don’t think about it that, because that was way long ago, is before my time. And so coming at it from that perspective of all, right, yes, how can I use this for good or for make my life easier? Your your examples are great. Curt, and we need more of those examples and more folks to talk about, hey, this is how you do super bill. How you get this done. This is how you automate, you know, figure out no shows. This is how you do automated billing. Those kind of highlights are definitely what we need more of to counteract some of the AI therapists are coming to replace you. And those kind of stories, we definitely need more of those.
Curt Widhalm 30:43
Where can people find out more about you and all of the wonderful work that you’re doing?
Dr. David Cooper 30:49
TherapistsInTech.com is a great place if you want to find out more about Therapists in Tech. I’ll plug the Society for Digital Mental Health. I’m a member there, too. The Behavioral Health Tech Conference, I’ll definitely plug that all the live long day. It is where all of us gather together for a couple of days and just nerd out about this stuff. I love it a lot. You can always find me on LinkedIn, trying to branch out into Tiktok and Instagram and do short videos now, kind of on some of this stuff, because that’s how everybody learns about stuff now, is through video. So I’m dipping my baby toe into that water, but LinkedIn is always a great place to find me. David Cooper’s ID on LinkedIn, but yeah, please. Anybody has questions? Anybody wants me to talk to students? Anything in between? I would love to. I know people who would love to. We want to make tech easier for folks to embrace and adopt, and make it less scary and provide a lot of these it’s not as easy and integrated into education as we’d like it to be, but we definitely want to make it easier for folks to learn about this stuff than it was for us starting out and teaching ourselves everything.
Curt Widhalm 31:56
And we will include links to all of Dr. Cooper’s stuff in our show notes over atmtsgpodcast.com. Follow us on our social media for more updates and things that we share. Join our Facebook group, the Modern Therapist Group, to continue on with this conversation and until next time, I’m Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy and Dr. David Cooper.
… 32:16
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