> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.clinikehr.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Write psychotherapy notes

> Keep psychotherapy notes apart from the client record, sign and lock them, ask one supervisor to co-sign, and release one only with the client authorization.

export const AuditNote = ({action = 'This action'}) => <div className="ck-callout ck-callout--info" role="note">
    <p className="ck-callout__body">
      {action} is written to your workspace's audit log with your name, the
      record touched and the time — a HIPAA requirement, and one you can review
      yourself under <strong>Audit Log</strong>. See{' '}
      <a href="/platform/security/audit-log">Audit log</a>.
    </p>
  </div>;

export const StillStuck = ({topic}) => <div className="ck-callout ck-callout--note" role="note">
    <p className="ck-callout__body">
      <strong>Still stuck{topic ? ` with ${topic}` : ''}?</strong>{' '}
      Check <a href="/platform/help/troubleshooting">Troubleshooting</a> first —
      it covers the failures we see most often. If that does not resolve it,{' '}
      <a href="/platform/help/contact-support">contact support</a> and include
      your workspace name and the time the problem happened, so we can find the
      matching entry in your audit log.
    </p>
  </div>;

export const TaskHeader = ({before, time, after}) => <div className="ck-task">
    {before ? <div className="ck-task__cell">
        <div className="ck-task__title">Before you start</div>
        <p className="ck-task__body">{before}</p>
      </div> : null}

    {time ? <div className="ck-task__cell">
        <div className="ck-task__title">Takes about</div>
        <p className="ck-task__body">{time}</p>
      </div> : null}

    {after ? <div className="ck-task__cell">
        <div className="ck-task__title">When you're done</div>
        <p className="ck-task__body">{after}</p>
      </div> : null}
  </div>;

export const Path = ({steps = []}) => <span className="ck-path">
    {steps.map((s, i) => <span key={i} className="ck-path__step">
        {i > 0 ? <span className="ck-path__sep" aria-hidden="true">
            ›
          </span> : null}
        {s}
      </span>)}
  </span>;

export const Availability = ({editions = ['all'], plans, roles, note}) => {
  const list = editions.includes('all') ? ['clinic', 'pharmacy', 'lims'] : editions;
  return <div className="ck-avail" role="note" aria-label="Feature availability">
      <span className="ck-avail__label">Available in</span>

      {list.map(e => <span key={e} className={`ck-pill ck-pill--${e}`}>
          {EDITION_LABELS[e] || e}
        </span>)}

      {plans ? <span className="ck-avail__label">Plan</span> : null}
      {plans ? <span className="ck-pill ck-pill--plan">{plans}</span> : null}

      {roles ? <span className="ck-avail__label">Who</span> : null}
      {roles ? <span className="ck-pill ck-pill--role">{roles}</span> : null}

      {note ? <span className="ck-avail__note">{note}</span> : null}
    </div>;
};

<Availability editions={['clinic']} plans="All plans" roles="Mental-health clinicians, and anyone an owner allows" />

A psychotherapy note is your own working record of a session. It is kept apart from the progress note and from the client's record, and only you, and a supervisor you name, can open it. It is on every plan, because keeping it private is not an upgrade.

<Path steps={['Sidebar', 'Notes', 'Psychotherapy notes']} />

<TaskHeader before="A client of your practice" time="A few minutes" after="A signed, locked note that only you can read" />

## How it differs from a progress note

* No one else sees it. Other staff see no row, no count and no placeholder, and the option does not appear for them.
* It is not on the client's record, the client portal or a guardian's view (which do not even show that it exists), your practice's normal export, a release of records, search, dashboards, or the developer API. It is never used by an AI agent or to train a model.
* It is not a progress note and there is no button that turns one into the other. You may copy your own words by hand.
* If a note comes from a substance use disorder program, 42 CFR Part 2 limits who it can be shared with.

## Who sees the option

Mental-health clinicians (by job title or by the type of licence on file) see a **Psychotherapy notes** tile on the **Notes** page, beside **Treatment plan**. Owners can allow anyone else by switching on **Write psychotherapy notes** in that person's permissions. Owners see the tile too, only to reach **Transfers** and the **Access log**. Everyone else sees the usual tiles and no sign that this exists.

## Start a note

<Steps>
  <Step title="Open the tab, or start from where you are">
    Select the **Psychotherapy notes** tile on the **Notes** page. You can also select **Private psychotherapy note** in the consultation chart, a ward chart, a client's **Notes** tab, a session on the calendar, or **Care team → My Patients** (the row menu and the detail sheet). Each opens the tab with the client already chosen; from a session the note is linked to that appointment but stored apart.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Choose the client and a starting point">
    Select **New psychotherapy note**, pick the client and the session date, and start from **A blank note** or one of your **Templates**.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Write and save">
    Select **Save draft** as you go. Every saved version is kept. You can delete a draft you wrote with **Delete draft**; the deletion is recorded.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Sign and lock">
    Select **Sign and lock**. After that the words cannot change and the note can never be deleted; add an addendum for anything new.
  </Step>
</Steps>

## Find your notes

The tab lists your notes, newest first, as **Draft**, **Signed** or **Awaiting co-signature**. **Search your notes** looks in the text and client names of your own notes only. It is never part of the clinic-wide search, and nobody else's results include your notes. **Client** filters the list to one person. Select **Back to notes** to leave the tab.

## Templates

Select **Templates**. A template is a name and a list of section headings, with an optional short prompt after a bar (for example `Hypotheses | working formulation`). A template never holds a client's details. You can keep your own or, as an owner or manager, offer one to everyone who writes these notes.

## Draft with AI

Select **Draft with AI**, paste your own rough notes, and the assistant tidies them into a draft added to the note. The note is marked as an AI draft, and you cannot sign it until you confirm you have read and edited it. It has its own instructions: it works with the process-oriented wording you wrote, adds nothing you did not write, and does not add diagnoses or billing language. It costs 1 AI credit each time and needs a paid plan; see [AI credits](/platform/plans/credits). On the Free plan the button explains this in the panel ("Draft with AI is available on paid plans. Your psychotherapy notes stay private either way.") and links to the plans; the note itself works the same without it.

## Ask a supervisor to co-sign

After you sign, select **Ask for co-signature** and choose one of your supervisors who is allowed to see the client. Only that supervisor can open the note, and only until they co-sign or decline. They choose a statement to attest to, as for other notes. You can withdraw the request while it is waiting.

## Reminders and overdue

If your clinic sets a co-sign deadline, the supervisor you asked gets a reminder a business day before it and a notice when it is overdue. Only the supervisor you named is told; owners and managers are not, because they cannot see that the note exists. The notices say nothing about the client or the note.

## Release a note

Select **Release with authorization** on a signed note. Choose the client's signed authorization for psychotherapy notes from the client's signed documents. The note downloads as a PDF with the authorization named on it. Each release is recorded. Without a signed document the option stays off.

## If the author leaves

Nobody can read the notes of a clinician who has left. An owner opens the **Transfers** sub-tab, chooses **Transfer**, picks the clinician who will hold them and gives a reason. The owner cannot read the notes from there.

## What owners can see

Owners get two more sub-tabs. **Transfers** moves a departed clinician's notes (see above). The **Access log** lists who created, opened, signed, released, transferred or exported notes and when. It never shows a client's name or any of the text. On the same sub-tab, **Export all psychotherapy notes** downloads a separate file with the clients' names and the full text, after you type the confirmation words. It is never part of your normal export.

## Who can do this

| Action | Who |
| - | - |
| Write, sign, add an addendum, release | The clinician who holds the note |
| Open and co-sign | The one supervisor named on the request, while it is waiting |
| Transfer notes of a departed clinician, see the access log, export | Owners only |

<AuditNote />

<StillStuck />


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