In her clinical psychology practice, Dr. Hughes sees individuals (adults and late adolescents) in psychotherapy. She specializes in the psychological effects of traumatic life events and the anxiety disorders. Dr. Hughes has successfully helped clients cope and heal from traumatic stress, PTSD, complex trauma, anxiety disorders, depression, and the general psychological effects of interpersonal violence.  Interpersonal violence is violence or abuse that is inflicted on one person by another, frequently, but not always, a person close to the victim. It includes intimate partner violence (domestic violence), coercive control, childhood sexual/physical/emotional abuse, rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment, cult abuse, and crime victimization. She has also worked with individuals who have experienced psychological aftereffects of other traumatic events, including terrorist attacks, severe accidents, and combat veterans.

Dr. Hughes' therapeutic approach is individually tailored to meet client's needs and includes cognitive-behavioral techniques such as psychoeducation, cognitive restructuring, and exposure and response prevention, which have shown promise in reducing anxiety symptomatology in clinical-research trials. Dr. Hughes maintains a trauma-informed lens and trauma-focused treatment for her clients who have been victimized, traumatized, or subjected to extremely life altering events. Dr. Hughes also engages her clients in active problem solving skills to facilitate an understanding of the formation and maintenance of their distress. Additionally, insight-oriented work is often utilized to promote meaning, to facilitate healing, and to promote long-term well-being.

General Overview

Psychotherapy has both benefits and risks. Risks sometimes include experiencing uncomfortable feelings, such as sadness, guilt, anxiety, anger, frustration, loneliness and helplessness. Psychotherapy often requires discussing unpleasant aspects of your life. However, psychotherapy has been shown to have benefits for individuals who undertake it. Therapy often leads to a significant reduction in feelings of distress, increased satisfaction in interpersonal relationships, greater personal awareness and insight, increased skills for managing stress, and resolutions to specific problems. But, there are no guarantees about what will happen. Psychotherapy requires a very active effort on your part. In order to be most successful, you will have to work on things that we discuss outside of sessions.

The first few sessions will involve a comprehensive evaluation of your needs. By the end of the evaluation, I will be able to offer you some initial impressions of what our work may include. At that point, we will discuss your treatment goals and create a personalized, initial treatment plan, if you decide to continue. You should evaluate this information as well as your own assessment about whether you feel comfortable working with me. Therapy involves a large commitment of time, money, and energy, so you should be very careful about the therapist you select. If you have questions about my procedures, we should discuss them whenever they arise.

You have the right to considerate, safe, and respectful care, without discrimination as to race, ethnicity, color, gender, sexual orientation, age, religion, national origin, or source of payment. You have the right to ask questions about any aspect of the therapy and about my specific training and experience. You have the right to expect that I will not have social or sexual relationships with clients or with former clients.

Confidentiality

The confidentiality of all communications between a client and a psychologist is generally protected by law and I, as your therapist, cannot and will not tell anyone else what you have discussed or even that you are in therapy without your permission.

In most situations, I can only release information about your treatment to others if you sign a written Authorization form that meets certain legal requirements imposed by HIPAA.

With the exception of certain specific situations dictated by law, you have the right to confidentiality of your therapy. You, on the other hand, may request that information is shared with whomever you choose and you may revoke that permission in writing at any time.

Insurance

Regrettably, Dr. Hughes does not accept insurance in her practice.  Her practice is fee-for-service only meaning that payment for services is required at the time of service.  However, Dr. Hughes does provide her clients with monthly billing statements that they submit to their respective insurance for out-of-network reimbursement.  She accepts checks or cash; no credit cards. You can verify with your insurance regarding their out-of-network reimbursement policy for individual psychotherapy CPT Code 90834.