Online Therapy in Ontario
If getting to an office isn't realistic for you right now, that doesn't mean putting therapy on hold. Online therapy gives you the same clinicians, the same clinical approach, and the same quality of care as our in-person sessions at 455 Spadina — from wherever you are in Ontario.
We see individuals and couples online across the province, from downtown Toronto to towns with no psychotherapist within an hour's drive. Same booking process, same insurance billing, same therapists who also see clients in our Toronto rooms. The only thing that changes is where you're sitting.
How online therapy sessions work
We run video sessions through Jane, the same platform we use to manage booking, billing, and clinical records. You don't need to download anything or create a separate account. Here's what actually happens:
You book online or through our front desk
The same way you would for an in-person appointment.
You'll get a confirmation email
Before your session, it arrives with a private link to your appointment.
At your session time, you click the link
On a laptop, tablet, or phone — and you're in a virtual waiting room until your therapist joins.
If your internet drops
Your therapist will call the phone number on file so the session continues without a gap.
A device, a private half hour, and a connection that holds.
That's the full list. You don't need special software, a webcam, or a quiet home office.
- A laptop, tablet, or smartphone with a camera and microphone.
- A private space where you can talk without being overheard — a bedroom with the door closed, a parked car, a walk with headphones if that's genuinely private for you.
- A reasonably stable internet connection. Wi-Fi or a wired connection works best; mobile data works too, but video quality can dip.
Private and protected under PHIPA
Ontario's health privacy law — the Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA) — governs how we collect, store, and share your clinical information, and it applies to online sessions exactly the way it applies to in-person ones. It isn't a lighter set of rules for video calls.
In practice, that means Jane's video platform is encrypted and built specifically for healthcare use, not a repurposed consumer video tool. Your session notes live in the same secure clinical record as an in-person client's would, with the same access controls, retention rules, and breach protocols. Nothing about seeing a therapist by video makes your information less protected than walking into our Spadina office would.
Is online therapy as effective as in-person therapy?
Honestly — for most people, yes. This isn't a marketing claim; it's what the research actually shows.
A 2024 systematic review published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal looked at randomized controlled trials comparing therapist-led remote CBT to in-person CBT across a range of conditions, and found no meaningful difference in outcomes between the two formats. A separate meta-analysis of randomized trials by Lin, Heckman, and Anderson reached the same conclusion across therapy types more broadly: video-based teletherapy performs on par with in-person therapy for common concerns like anxiety, depression, and relationship distress, with comparable rates of clients staying in treatment.
Where the research gets more nuanced is around format and fit. Some studies find slightly higher drop-out for video sessions than phone or in-person, particularly for less experienced clinicians who haven't adapted their approach to a screen — which is part of why we don't treat online work as a lesser version of the same session, but as its own skill our therapists are trained in. And the evidence for video therapy is strongest for individual work with mild-to-moderate anxiety, depression, and relationship concerns. It's thinner for more acute or complex presentations, where being in the same room can matter more.
Couples work adds its own wrinkle. Emotionally Focused Therapy — which several of our therapists, including our founder, are trained in directly — relies heavily on reading in-the-moment emotional shifts between partners, and some clinicians assume that only translates in person. In practice, EFT couples work online holds up well: what matters most is that both partners can see and hear each other clearly and that the therapist can track the interaction, both of which video handles fine. The bigger risk factor for couples isn't the screen — it's whether both partners can find a genuinely private room at the same time, which is worth planning for before your first session.
Online therapy works as well as in-person therapy for most of what brings people to us — individual and couples work alike. It isn't automatically the right fit for every situation, which is worth being upfront about.
Is online therapy right for you?
Online works beautifully for a lot of people — and in a handful of situations, being in the room really does serve you better. Here's the honest breakdown.
Where online works well
- Parents of young kids who can't reliably leave the house at a fixed time.
- People in smaller Ontario cities and towns without a local EFT- or CBT-trained therapist who fits what they're looking for.
- Anyone whose week doesn't allow for a commute on top of a session — shift workers, people with long drives, caregivers.
- Clients who find it easier to open up from a familiar space than a clinical office.
- Couples who want to do the work together but can't always coordinate being in the same physical place at the same time.
When in-person might serve you better
- If you're in an acute crisis or working through active suicidal ideation — in-person care, or a hospital or crisis line, is the safer starting point, not video.
- If you don't have a private space at home and can't find one elsewhere, session quality suffers regardless of the platform.
- Younger children in play therapy generally do better with physical materials and a therapist in the room.
- If unstable internet keeps interrupting sessions, the format itself becomes the obstacle.
- Some people simply do their best work face-to-face — a legitimate reason to choose our Toronto office instead.
If you're not sure which applies to you, say so on your consult call. We'll help you figure out which format actually fits, rather than defaulting you into whichever one is easier to book.
Online therapy across Ontario
Because we're not limited to who can physically get to Spadina Avenue, we work with clients across the province — including cities where finding a therapist trained in EFT or CBT locally can be a real challenge. We regularly see clients in the communities below, along with smaller towns in between.
Being CRPO-registered means our therapists are licensed to practice anywhere in Ontario, not just the GTA. If you've searched for "online therapy Ottawa" or "online counselling Thunder Bay" and come up short on options that match your needs, that's usually a supply problem in your city, not a sign that good therapy isn't available to you — it's available, just not always local. Online sessions close that gap.
For clients further from Toronto, the time savings are real too. A weekly session that would mean a multi-hour round trip becomes a 50-minute block you can fit around work, school pickup, or a night shift. That's not a minor convenience — for a lot of people, it's the difference between therapy staying consistent and it quietly dropping off the schedule after a few weeks.
Insurance coverage and direct billing
Online sessions are billed exactly the same as in-person sessions. If your extended health plan covers psychotherapy with a Registered Psychotherapist, it covers it whether you're sitting across from your therapist in our office or on a video call — same session codes, same rates, same receipts.
Where we can, we bill your insurer directly so you're not covering the full cost upfront and waiting on reimbursement. Our direct billing page lists which insurers we work with and how to check your specific plan before your first session.
One thing worth knowing about OHIP
OHIP doesn't cover psychotherapy from a Registered Psychotherapist, in-person or online. Most clients use extended health benefits or pay out of pocket — which is why we offer direct billing wherever possible.
Multilingual online therapy, anywhere in Ontario
This is one of the clearest advantages of working online: our therapists offer sessions in eight languages beyond English, and it doesn't matter what city you're in — you get the same access to a therapist who works in your first language as someone living two blocks from our office.
For a lot of clients, being able to describe what they're feeling in the language they think and dream in changes what's actually possible in a session. Online sessions mean the right language match matters more than the right postal code.
Common questions about online therapy
The only thing that changes is where you're sitting.
Book a free consultation, or reach out with any questions first — we'll help you figure out whether online or in-person is the right fit for you.
Based in Toronto, serving all of Ontario
Toronto, ON M5S 2G8