Summary

Pros: Clean Intuitive Interface, Easy to Learn, Fast Development Cycle, Full-Featured Client Portal, Integrated Telehealth

Cons: Treatment Plans aren’t fully integrated with Progress Notes

Standout Features: User-Friendly Interface, Full-Featured Client Portal, Tight Integration of Features, Integrated Telehealth

It Might Be A Good Choice For Practices That: Practices that want an easy to use application with a robust feature set, and don’t have a need for fully integrated treatment plans and progress notes.

Review

After its launch in 2013, SimplePractice quickly became a leading application for solo providers and, since then, have expanded their feature set to include clinician groups.  They have kept the interface clean and straightforward, while adding significant functionality to support group practices.  In addition to already supporting integrated ERAs, SimplePractice has continued to expand their client portal, which is one of the most full-featured available.  It includes the ability to present custom documents and forms to clients for them to complete online, online bill pay, secure messaging, and much more.  Additionally, SimplePractice has expanding the ability for clinicians to indicate their availability for specific types of sessions (i.e. intakes only during certain times) within the client portal. With the addition of these features and its mobile app, SimplePractice continues to be a “must consider” application for solo practitioners and now a solid candidate for groups as well.

SimplePractice sports a very clean and fairly intuitive interface.  It offers multiple paths to navigate to different areas of the application which is great for a smooth work flow.  The client screen is an excellent example of the attention paid to ease of access to information.  On this one screen, you are able to easily see contact information, balance due, upcoming appointments, and access previous notes. Being able to access everything you need for a client from this one screen is a real time saver. Scheduling is easy and clicking on current appointments offers you the option of editing the appointment, entering payments or accessing previous notes  SimplePractice also makes it easy to export your data should you need to. With the addition of group functionality, flexibility has been incorporated so that solo users don’t see group functionality that they don’t need.

SimplePractice has also integrated telehealth. I found it to be intuitive, easy to use, at least during the brief time I tested it, of high quality.  This feature allows you to readily schedule, connect, and conduct a telehealth session with a client, all within the SimplePractice system. SimplePractice is also one of the rare applications that allows you to track referral sources and provides a scheduling widget you can integrate into your own web site.

Historically, the area in SimplePractice I’ve felt has needed the most improvement is documentation.  They’ve made significant strides here recently. In addition to provide a large library of templates, they also offer the integration of the Wiley Treatment Planners. With the option of creating your own templates, there is a significant amount of flexibility offered. The one thing I’d still like to see is a tighter integration of Treatment Plan and Progress Note.  Users can see the Treatment Plan in the Progress Note, but can’t directly address goals/objectives inline with the treatment plan.

With such a strong set of features, many practices will find that SimplePractice is worth consideration. This is especially the case if they value a full-featured client portal.