The cost of psychotherapy/counseling is very diverse in the Nigerian market space. I'm not entirely certain what influences the final rationale for disparity in cost from practitioner to practitioner. But I suspect that, some of the considerations may be:

(a) Competence: This, alongside experience, may inform pricing. While competence can affect the fee demanded by a practitioner, I'm not entirely certain that (just like in other fields) a high fee is a guarantee that competence exists or that a lower fee means competence is absent. A bit more considerations may be going into these decisions.

(b) Possible comparison with pricing as practiced among certain circles or even abroad. Since psychotherapy services can be offered virtually, if a certain practitioner has a range of clientele who pay a certain amount, this might become a benchmark within which such a practitioner may be willing to accept and work by.

(c)The technicality required to competently deploy a psychotherapeutic modality: While I'm not advocating for super expensive fees, psychotherapy being talk therapy can sometimes be viewed as 'simply talk' between a practitioner and a client. However, there is a lot that goes into competently helping a person to find and hold unto helpful states of mind, plus learning to go on to manage helpful states of mind on a moment-by-moment basis without necessarily resorting to unhelpful coping strategies, or strategies that only soothe a person rather than help a person grow into becoming actually better for themselves and society.

(d) other considerations I may not be aware of.

Talk therapy is very important for people experiencing emotional, psychological, and behavioral issues. It is also very important for people who simply want to be able to go through every day with some level of maturity, responsibility and intention; being able to choose what state of mind they would prefer to predominantly live life by.

It is essential to have therapy reach everyone who needs such services. I also think that some form of funding pool may help support the efforts at affordable services. There are practitioners whose fees are not as high as feared. They probably serve a demographic who are accepting of their fees.

Hopefully, the issues around fees, funding and helpful partnerships around this sector can become something that can be worked out for the benefit of everyone.



This post was written by Fabian Igbaji.

Fabian Igbaji is a Certified Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Practitioner who offers services both Virtually (WhatsApp or Zoom) and In-person (that is, physically).

His practice is on Instagram: @cyd_sessions
Email: contact@cydsessions.com or cydsessions@gmail.com