Get to Know Kathleen Coughlin, LCSW and UpLift Senior Director of Clinical Services and Quality Assurance

UpLift’s “Get to Know” series features our providers so that other providers can get to know them, learn from each other, and connect. 

This month’s featured provider is Kathleen Coughlin, LCSW, who is part of UpLift’s clinical team and brings her experience to build our clinical program.

What are you passionate about when it comes to therapy? 

I’m passionate about providing equitable access to therapy and psychiatry services. Whether someone has private insurance, private pay, Medicare, or Medicaid, they should have access to quality mental health providers. One of the big things that drew me to UpLift was their long-term desire to expand access beyond commercial plans and add other types of insurance, like Medicare and Medicaid. 

Everyone faces different stressors and pressures. In my private practice, I work with clients going through life transitions, divorce, separations, and high-conflict personal relationships. Taking time out for therapy to process emotions, increase coping skills, and have a sounding board outside of everyday relationships can be beneficial. I also encourage mental health providers to take time for themselves and seek supportive counseling to help with balancing personal, professional, and family commitments.

What does your role entail?

I’m the Senior Director of Clinical Services and Quality Assurance. My role supports the clinical team, quality assurance, contracted therapists, and our psychiatry team. My role is to interface with psychiatry and therapy providers, quality assurance, product, and data teams to support clinical program needs. UpLift providers will reach out for clinical consults as needs arise with their caseload. They may need support or recommendations or an opportunity to process a difficult situation that a client is experiencing. They might just need a check-in with another colleague as they are working remotely—and remote clinical work can sometimes be very lonely.

Sometimes, it’s helpful for providers to be able to pick up the phone or email someone to ask for some time to chat. I think that’s something that our team tries to offer our providers. Danielle Besuden, our quality assurance manager, and I are licensed clinical social workers, allowing us to support our provider community clinically.

We’re also there to support clients as needs arise. For example, a client may need to be connected with a specialty provider or need help connecting with an in-person provider. We can do some research and assist in these cases. 

How do you support providers?

Providers might reach out if clients have more intensive needs that they may feel uncomfortable providing services for on a remote therapy platform. We may discuss the client and the specific scenario that the client is experiencing. Then, we will assist the provider in finding some in-person recommendations that they might want to consider.

That’s one way we provide support. When working with our psychiatry program, providers and clients communicate and collaborate extensively regarding medication, refills, scheduling, prior authorizations, and similar matters. We also help ensure that clients have follow-up appointments. 

As UpLift continues to grow, we recognize the importance of supporting clients and providers. 

How are you ensuring clients get quality care?

UpLift has developed a Common Factor Survey and other measures to help us understand clients' feelings about their therapeutic experience. The survey is sent to clients after their third and ninth sessions. The questions included in the survey are: 

• My therapist and I are working towards goals we both agree on.

• I feel like I am able to be open and honest with my therapist.
• I feel accepted and respected by my therapist.
• My therapist understands or takes the time to understand my culture, values, or the background that makes me who I am.
• My therapist has the expertise to help me.
• My therapist explains my problems in a way I understand.
• If I do what's expected of me in therapy, I have a good chance to deal with my problems.

The data allows us to examine provider charts. We also do random audits of providers and their documentation to identify areas they might want to build on within their notes to support medical necessity, which is what insurance companies look at during an audit. 

What inspired you to get into therapy?

I was going to become a teacher. I completed a year in education while I worked in a psychiatric inpatient unit. During that time, I became interested in working in inpatient psychiatric care and decided to complete my bachelor’s degree in social work and then my master’s in social work. 

I realized I enjoyed social work and collaborating with other social workers—directly supporting clients transitioning from the inpatient unit to their home and preparing the family to welcome adolescent and adult loved ones back into their care. I wanted to help ensure that upon discharge, the family has the services they need and that the client is connected with the resources they need to sustain themselves and excel in the community.

Early in my career, I worked as a clinical care manager for inpatient psychiatric care, where we evaluated people who had been in inpatient care for three to seven days. This experience taught me the importance of continuity of care and stepping clients down from higher levels of care to outpatient services. 

Over the years, I have owned and operated two group practices with 6 to 16 providers. I enjoy working with a specialized population going through life transitions, like co-parenting challenges during a divorce that can sometimes involve the courts. My role was to help facilitate effective communication between parents to reduce the stress on their children. 

What is your favorite resource to share?

I suggest community groups or organizations when providing resources to clients returning to the community. Maybe someone is experiencing substance use issues, so I’d suggest Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous or connecting them with other supports that way. 

For UpLift, sometimes we help people who come from higher levels of care. We’ll get contacted by insurance companies to get clients seen sooner upon discharge, scheduled, and have a follow-up in place. A discharge plan from any level of care is crucial to a client's success. They don’t have to wait six months to see a psychiatrist, which is key for them. We can connect clients to psychiatry and therapy services quickly. 

What is the best therapy-related article or resource that you've read recently?

I read a recent article on the importance of collaboration between behavioral health services and primary care. The article discussed the exchange of information between a family doctor and a psychiatry provider on how to alert a family doctor that a client was seen and what medications they’re on. 

We’re thinking about how to make it easy for providers to connect with clients and make referrals on UpLift. Between our therapy and psychiatry providers, they can drop a line about what’s going on with their clients. Why did a provider want their client seen? Then the providers can have a deeper discussion to support the mutual client. Our platform lets them review each other’s notes.

We are able to communicate with a primary care physician if the client signs a release of information. Psychiatry and therapy providers work closely to understand how best to support  clients. The content of the documentation helps each one understand how a client is progressing. 

What is your favorite way to practice self-care recently that you would recommend to other mental health providers?

I recently started practicing yoga and have found it very helpful mentally and physically. I look forward to the sessions and leave feeling rejuvenated. 

My major passions are racket sports, tennis, padel, and mostly pickleball. I also enjoy bike riding, which I do in the mornings before the Florida heat sets in.  

What is a book that you read recently that you would recommend to anyone? 

It’s by Dr. Debra K. Carter, ​​CoParenting After Divorce: A GPS For Healthy Kids. It’s about care and coordination for high-conflict divorces and parents going through high-conflict divorces. It helps parents develop a roadmap as they start the initial phases of divorce or separation. 

The book goes through steps and stages of how parents can communicate in a way that doesn’t impact the overall health or well-being of their children—because high-conflict divorce and parenting can become problematic and impact children early on. 

My role as a parenting coordinator is to support parents in improving communication, decreasing stress during weekend exchanges, and learning to talk in front of their children respectfully. I value that book because it is a good guide for parents going through divorce and beginning to co-parent together. 

How do you believe that change happens for a client?

Change happens at different times for different reasons. If someone is seeking counseling services, they are exploring possible steps they want to take or decisions they want to make. 

Therapists must listen and not push clients in certain directions. Instead, they should allow clients to take steps themselves. 

I’ve worked with clients who are in unhealthy relationships or high-conflict relationships. They might come into counseling and still be in that relationship. They might recognize it’s an unhealthy relationship but remain in that for another six weeks, six months, six years—but sometimes, getting to where they realize that they can take the steps and move away from that is where change happens. 

It could happen early on but they might still need to take action. Maybe they have young children, or they don’t have the financial means to live on their own right now. Perhaps they need specific support for education or employment to sustain family income. 

I always encourage clients to return to counseling as they go through changes or explore new relationships outside of their previous unhealthy ones. I think it’s helpful for them to reflect on the changes they want to make and understand what wasn’t healthy about past relationships. Also, it gives them a space to explore the question, “What do I want to do differently?”

Maybe there are flags they’ve seen or shifts they want to make in their lives as they’ve grown. How have they seen themselves grow over that time period, being away from that relationship? People sometimes need a bit of time to see it. It is important to be there and listen as a clinician—and to let people go at their own pace.

What advice do you have for someone starting out building their practice?

UpLift provides an excellent opportunity to build a solid caseload. 

Most of all, we manage the back end and administrative tasks such as credentialing, billing, and claims follow-up. pressure. Our platform’s technology allows them to grow their practices without worrying, “Is this claim processing? Was I paid for this client’s session or not?”

Managing your own practice, whether on your own or for a larger group, involves a lot of behind-the-scenes work with billing, claims management, and other things. It’s nice to know that you’re working with an organization looking at quality, data, and ensuring all items are listed in your notes so that your charts will pass an insurance audit. 

Why did you choose UpLift?

Being at UpLift allowed me to work with an excellent team. I was driven by the idea of helping the organization grow. I’ve gotten to start our policies and procedures, which we have used over the years. 

I love my job and the people I work with. There’s never a day I don’t look forward to coming into the office—remotely, which is one of the big pros. 

It’s a new and innovative behavioral health platform, and that was interesting to me. I value the ability to work as a team, having both psychiatry and therapy, and being able to refer clients between the two so they don’t have to wait extended periods. We can provide better care and services because people receive care when needed. I think that’s what’s beneficial about our program.