When looking for a new training, it is intuitive that we want to act in the best way possible, right? This is no different when we talk about Psychoanalysis, since this therapy is very important and widely recognized. Furthermore, it is necessary that the environment used to act, such as a clinic, be well located and welcoming, so that the client feels well. Do you know how setting up a psychoanalysis clinic? No? Then check it out now!

Let's talk about eight important points to build your practice and maintain it:

• choice of place;
• choice of days and times of attendance;
• choice of furniture and decoration of the environment;
• creation of the CNPJ;
• fulfillment of the requirements to be and remain a psychoanalyst;
• issuing notes or receipts;
• issuing certificates or declarations of attendance;
• registration to belong to health plans or partnerships.

Every semester, we teach a 3-hour live, in which we discuss these issues concerning How to Set Up a Practice The recording of the live is available to students in the members area, along with all the lives of our psychoanalysis course.

First step to set up a psychoanalysis clinic: choose a good location

It is important that the place to set up the psychoanalysis clinic be suitable in several aspects, such as:

• office location : close to where your patients live, work, or commute;
• space size : it doesn't have to be big, but it shouldn't be too tight;
• site entrance and exit If it is a residence, it is good to have a separate entrance from the house;
• silence and privacy : avoid excessive noise from the street and neighboring commercial rooms (check if the acoustics are good and if the rooms have walls that guarantee acoustic insulation);
• cost/benefit : choose the ideal room for your financial conditions and with realistic estimates of return.

Before buying or renting a space, check if the place is well located, with easy access by car and bus, and also check if the neighborhood is noisy or not, since silence is important for the sessions. Moreover, the usable size of the space must be considered, since it is important that the client has room to move around according to demand.

We understand that you can adapt a location in your home to attend in person Nothing would be more annoying than for your analisand to see the mess at home and the noise of people, and it would also be terrible for him to have to go through the inside of your house to get to the doctor's office.

If you are renting a space in a commercial environment, it can be an office:

• Exclusively yours in a commercial building or suite of rooms, or in a house converted to be a consulting room;
• In a coworking space where you rent a room by the hour(s), according to your demand; there are already coworkings in the big cities that specialize in the health or therapy area;
• In partnership with another health or therapy professional, such as another psychoanalyst, or psychologist, or even someone from another health or therapy field.

In this last option of partnering with an existing practice (of psychoanalysis or other field), you can:

• pay by the hour (like coworking), or
• use on the space owner's day off, or
• make an exchange for their services, or
• by opening up your own office space (if you have one) for the practitioner to use once a week (on a day when you have no services there), in exchange for using this day in his space (the advantage of this would be to extend the geographical reach and the respective specialists to help make reciprocal referrals).

In the case of a partnership, it is good to be an environment at least adaptable to psychoanalysis It would not be appropriate, for example, to use a dentist's office that has a dentist's chair "making up" the analytical setting.

A location of your office needs to be relatively close to its audience:

• where does your audience live?
• where does your audience work?
• your audience doesn't live or work, but passes through there?

In almost every city, there are neighborhoods or regions that come to be seen by the residents as "doctor's area" or "medical district", because they have many doctors and other health services. It is usually a good choice to be in such a region, because of the mental association that the population has already established.

The space you choose also needs to be suitable for online appointments.

Second step to set up a psychoanalytic office: choose days and times of service

Going back to what we said before, it is important for you to keep in mind that you don't need to have only one office ... see:

• Whether you attend in person or online, you already have "two" practices, that is, two places of service.
• You can work Monday through Wednesday in your own office, and Thursday and Friday in partner offices, even in other neighboring cities, which would increase your reach.

The question of days and times is very important. About the days of operation you can choose to act:

• Monday through Friday;
• Tuesday through Saturday;
• Monday through Saturday.

Many psychologists choose to meet on Saturdays because it is a day off for many patients. There are analyzed patients who, even though they have time slots during the week, prefer to meet on Saturdays. This is because they are quieter days, or because the analyzed can focus better on their therapy.

On the other hand, there are psychoanalysts who do not work on Saturdays, due to personal choice, dedicating their Saturdays to study, rest, or spend them with their families.

I want information to enroll in the Psychoanalysis Course .

There are psychoanalysts who take Sunday and Monday off, preferring to work on Saturdays.

The same logic we said for the days also applies to the opening hours which can be:

• business hours only (on working days);
• business hours + evenings (or at least early evenings), on weekdays;
• business hours + evenings (on weekdays) + Saturdays (full day or part time).
• afternoons + evenings (or at least early evenings), on weekdays;
• afternoons + evenings (on weekdays) + Saturdays (full day or part time).

The interesting thing about attending early evenings is to reach an audience that is leaving work. Because of this, some psychoanalysts choose not to attend in the morning during the week, as they will attend in the afternoons and evenings.

As for the days and times, there is no rule. See what time arrangement works best for you.

To not "break" your days too much, in the beginning (while you don't have many patients) you can choose two or three days or periods of the week to attend Then you zoom in.

Step three to set up a clinic: choose your furniture and decoration

As a psychoanalytic office, an armchair for you and an armchair for your patient would already be the basics for the structure of the face-to-face analytic setting. A couch and other heavier decorations are not always possible when the office is not exclusively yours.

Some smaller items like books and small decorative objects you can even bring to a "mobile" office, like a coworking or partnership office.

If you have the possibility set up your own practice, we recommend items such as :

• three armchairs and a couple of stools that you can move around in the office space: you can serve parents or couples;
• couch: although it is the piece of furniture that best characterizes psychoanalysis, many psychoanalysts today prefer not to have a couch and attend only from armchairs (our suggestion: have a couch if you can, it may happen that a client will feel more comfortable to talk);
• desk (you won't use it during the service, but you can use it to study during your spare time);
• curtains or blinds to avoid outside light (if there are windows);
• Pleasant lighting that helps the feeling of tranquility and comfort, at least not so strong and direct light on the patient or the analyst;
• a table with water and glasses, also accessible to the patient;
• pictures, shelves, books, plants, lamps, decorative objects, small tables (to place tissues next to the patient's chair);
• air conditioning or quiet ceiling fan;
• if there is a waiting room (not necessarily a receptionist): water, glasses, armchairs, coffee table (with some magazines), access to toillette;
• if you are serving children: you can create a playful space, with a lower table, toys, sheets of paper and pencils for drawings, more colorful decoration, etc.

Still on the couch, remember not putting the couch in front of the psychoanalyst The purpose of the couch is for the patient to feel more comfortable with it, which includes not having a direct look at the psychoanalyst.

You will also need these resources below, but depending on the commercial condominium you are in (if it is a commercial building, for example), this may be shared use with other rooms :

• interphone (so you can talk to the building's reception desk, or directly to the client);
• a waiting room with water, magazines, a coffee table and benches;
• a toillette.

Localized disclosure signs are optional: outside (visible to the street) and/or inside (small door sign, if it is a room in a commercial building).

Retrace your patient's journey from arrival to the end of the service. gradually increase what you deem necessary .

I want information to enroll in the Psychoanalysis Course .

If you work with child psychoanalysis, you will need to set up a suitable environment for drawing and playing, as well as for attending to parents as well.

Don't look for the "perfect environment", because there is no such thing as a perfect environment; you can add to and delete elements from your space over time.

Fourth step to set up a psychoanalysis clinic: opening a company with CNPJ

Our understanding is that the psychoanalyst is a liberal or autonomous professional The financial gains can be declared in the income tax, regardless of having an open company.

There is also the option of setting up a company, a CNPJ. In the list of activities, the CNAE (activity code) that seems to fit best is: 8650-0/03 - Psychology and Psychoanalysis Activities .

This psychoanalyst CNAE includes:

• Psychoanalysis Activity
• Psychoanalysis Clinic
• Psychoanalysis Office
• Clinic, office, or psychology center
• Psychology Services.

See that the same CNAE applies to psychologists and psychoanalysts So, if your accountant asks for your CRP (Regional Council of Psychology registration number) to open a practice:

• if you are also a psychologist (majoring in psychology and majoring in psychoanalysis), you will have to inform your CRP and register with the CRP, paying annuities and other obligations of the council.
• if you are only a psychoanalyst (trained in psychoanalysis and not trained in psychology), there is no CRP or registration number to report, because psychoanalysts do not submit to any council or order.

So there is no psychoanalyst registration number to report. It will be enough for your accountant to open your psychoanalysis practice using the CNAE we have reported (8650-0/03).

Also, it is important not to confuse:

• CBO - Brazilian Occupation Cadastre The CBO of a psychoanalyst is number 2515-50, which is the number that identifies the profession before the MTE (Ministry of Labor and Employment), that is, the work code or "profession" of the psychoanalyst. Your accountant does not need to know the CBO, nor use this number to open your company.
• CNAE - National Registry of Economic Activities The CNAE is the number used to identify the company's activity, and it is this number that your accountant needs to set up the company. The CNAE of a psychoanalyst and psychoanalysis clinic is 8650-0/03.
• CRP - Regional Council of Psychology Only psychologists have a CRP. If you are a psychoanalyst and a psychologist (that is, you have both educations), you will have a CRP. But if you are only a psychoanalyst (not a psychologist), you will not have a CRP, nor will you have to report anything to this board.

CNAE 8650-0/03:

• allows you to open a Simples Nacional company (recommended) ;
• but does not allow you to open an MEI (individual micro-entrepreneur, which has a lower and simplified tax cost for companies with an annual turnover of less than R$ 80,000.00).

There are no therapist or consultant CNAEs that the psychoanalyst can use to be an MEI. There is the CNAE "numerologist" that allows you to open a CNPJ as MEI and even issue invoices, but it seems to us a CNAE too distant from what a psychoanalyst does. Anyway, check with your accountant and see this list of CNAEs allowed for MEI (from time to time the list changes).

The interesting thing about setting up a CNPJ of Simples Nacional are the possibilities:

• issue invoices,
• to be hired by companies (which, generally, will ask for invoices) and
• collect INSS and, with this, be entitled to retirement and sick leave.

Today, the company registration systems are more interconnected. In any case, by opening a CNPJ, even if he does only ONE registration and pays only the Simples Nacional, the therapist will have his company open at the instances:

• municipal (City Hall) This is the one that inspects the ISS tax (tax on services rendered) and the use of urban space;
• federal (Internal Revenue Service) which oversees the IR tax (income tax) and Simples Nacional.

So, both the City Hall and the Internal Revenue Service can inspect the therapist, including making opening company inspections and regular inspections. If you open your company as Simples Nacional, the ISS and IR will be included in Simples, you don't need to pay them separately. It doesn't mean that the ISS and IR cease to exist; it means that they are embedded in the single payment.made by Simples Nacional.

Thus:

• as a company/CNPJ, in addition to the Simples Nacional monthly and the DAS (Annual Declaration of Simples) ,
• you will also be required to do Individual Income Tax (as an individual entrepreneur / CPF).

The municipality can also determine specific rules about:

• urban zoning (neighborhood in which the CNAE is allowed),
• obtaining municipal registration (registration or change of address of the company in the municipality),
• accessibility for people with disabilities (PCD),
• bathroom in the commercial room (or at least in the building, if it is a group of rooms, as some municipalities require accessible bathrooms),
• agreement with the fire department for the inspection certificate (AVCB),
• fire extinguishers within the validity period,
• among other aspects of tax inspection or site survey.

It is important that you check the specifics of your municipality to make sure which rules for business location and physical space your municipality requires. Usually, even neighborhoods that are considered residential allow you to be the headquarters of a psychoanalysis office, but some municipalities may refuse this and only allow offices in commercial or mixed (commercial + commercial) neighborhoods.residential).

Being a service provider, the psychoanalyst will not have state registration and will not be able to sell goods, medicines, etc.

Our course does not provide accounting advice So, find the accountant you trust and present these reflections, to see what is most appropriate to set up a psychoanalysis clinic.

If you are a student or former student and do not have an accountant you trust, please contact the staff of the Psychoanalysis Clinic Course to ask for a referral to the accounting office responsible for our Institute.

Fifth step to set up a psychoanalytic clinic: fulfilling the requirements to be and remain a psychoanalyst

You do not need to have a card of any union, council or order There is no Council of Psychoanalysis or Order of Psychoanalysts, these instances can only be created by Law and are governmental regulations, not private ones. There is also no Union, because Psychoanalysis is a craft, not a profession. A Union also depends on governmental deliberation to be created.

Whoever uses these names (Council or Order) is, in our view, acting in bad faith, because it is a private company and something not mandatory passing itself off as an official body.

The only thing certain that you will need to continue working as a psychoanalyst is (in addition to having an education in the field), to keep developing according to the tripod of Psychoanalysis. We will explain it better below.

By international convention, you can only be called Psychoanalyst and work with psychoanalysis if you are Graduated in Psychoanalysis (in a Psychoanalysis Training Course such as ours) and, after graduating, continue to exercise the psychoanalytic tripod in a PERMANENT manner:

• Theory : studies and courses, such as Advanced Course Topics in Psychoanalytic Technique and the Advanced Course on Personalities and Psychopathologies that our Institute offers.
• Supervision : report and have a follow-up on the cases you are attending, with a more experienced psychoanalyst or with a psychoanalytic Institute or Association, such as the Supervision and Membership for Psychoanalysts that our Institute offers, with a supervisor at your disposal and live meetings to discuss specifically the cases of the psychoanalyst being supervised.
• Personal Analysis : the psychoanalyst needs to be analyzed by another psychoanalyst in order to deal with his own issues; for our students and former students, we have indications of psychoanalysts from the Institute, contact us to know more.

If not trained and if, after being trained, not following through with theory, supervision and analysis, the professional will be anything, but he will not be a psychoanalyst And, if he is positioning himself as a psychoanalyst and providing services as a psychoanalyst, if he is denounced, he will not have the factual and institutional elements to prove that he is in fact a psychoanalyst, if he has abandoned the continuous training of the tripod.

So, if the professional wants to work as a psychoanalyst but does not want to continue living Psychoanalysis, he will not be being honest and careful with his patients. So, if you feel called to work with Psychoanalysis, keep on studying (taking advanced courses), being supervised by a more experienced psychoanalyst and doing yourpersonal analysis.

There is no internship in Psychoanalysis Any obligation for a student of psychoanalysis to do an internship would be contrary to licensing principle That is, each psychoanalyst must know the moment in which he or she feels ready to act in the field. If he or she is acting, he or she needs to follow the psychoanalytic tripod (study theory, be analyzed by another psychoanalyst, and be supervised by another psychoanalyst). Our Training Course follows this service and does not offer or require "internship" as a condition to conclude the course.

Sixth step to set up a psychoanalytic office: issuing notes or receipts

Maintaining your psychoanalytic practice will demand that you keep updating through the psychoanalytic tripod There is no doubt that the most committed analisands are those who come by word of mouth from previous patients who liked the therapy.

In addition, you will have many bureaucracies to manage in the relationship with your condo, coworking, partners, etc.

In this chapter, we will talk about the bureaucracy of the issue of issuing invoices and receipts .

You can do simple receipts as a psychoanalyst There are templates on the internet to base your receipt on, such as your logo, signature, receipt number, and description of the service with the date and amount paid.

You can issue a receipt as a legal entity or as an individual, that is, having or not having a publicly traded company The receipt, as the name says, is a "received", a way for you to tell the person who paid that person paid.

Now, this does a psychoanalyst's receipt have any value in income tax?

• Yes, it has value for you that you issued If you don't have a CNPJ, the money you receive as a freelancer is also "income", to be declared in your personal income tax;
• No, it has no value for your patient who received the receipt Make it clear to your patient who asks for a receipt that this receipt cannot be declared as a "full" personal income tax deduction.

If your patient uses the receipt as a deduction in his income tax return, it is as if he is making up money, i.e., he will reduce the income tax payable or refund the income tax already paid. Psychoanalysis is not tax deductible .

If your client declares a psychoanalyst's receipt to reduce or refund income tax, your client will fall into a fine mesh, will be called by the tax authorities, and will then pay interest and a fine for the tax incorrectly deducted. Prevent your patient from getting in trouble with the Tax Authorities:

• when delivering the receipt, advise your patient that the amount of the receipt is not tax deductible for income tax purposes; and/or
• have a stamp or print on your receipt the following phrase: " According to the tax legislation, the receipt value referring to Psychoanalysis services cannot be used as a deductible expense in the Income Tax return - full modality ".

If this notice is printed or stamped on the receipt that you give to your patient, the patient (or their accountant) will pick up this receipt when they do their income tax, and will have one more chance to be warned not to include the receipt amount as a deductible expense.

The income tax law defines which areas of health care are included for this purpose, psychoanalysis IS NOT one of them .

Psychology yes: if the psychoanalyst is also a psychologist, he can issue a receipt for this purpose, as a psychologist, even if he follows psychoanalysis as his main technique .

If you are a psychologist who also works as a psychoanalyst, you do not need to add these information and alerts, since psychology is a tax-deductible expense .

Remembering that in relation to all these issues concerning accounting advice, each psychoanalyst should hire the accountant he trusts to deal with these matters. Talk to your accountant about these issues concerning opening a company, framing the company's activity, collecting INSS (as an autonomous worker or as a businessman), issuing bills and receipts.

If you are a student or an ex-student, you can contact us to ask for an accounting office that serves our Institute, and we will inform you of the contact.

Step seven to set up a clinic: can I issue a certificate or declaration of attendance?

Psychoanalyst cannot issue a medical certificate and/or a leave of absence certificate Psychoanalysts cannot issue this kind of certificate even if the patient needed an "emergency" psychoanalysis session.

Exception made if the psychoanalyst is also a doctor or a professional in another field in which this type of certificate is allowed. In this case, the certificate will be in relation to this other profession, not as a psychoanalyst.

As for the Statement of Attendance to the psychoanalysis session We understand that the psychoanalyst can issue this kind of statement, since it is just a statement that the analyzed attended the clinic at that time.

But this does not bind (not oblige) the employer. In this case, it is important to let your examinee know that. And to be printed on the declaration that it is a FAILURE to attend, stating the start and end time of the session.

What usually happens is that, in these cases, there is a common sense of the employer to consider the justification for the period of the session + the time needed for commuting in traffic (before and after the session).

But, we repeat: this does not oblige the employer to accept Ideally, the analisand should not use working hours for psychoanalytic therapy, or should make prior arrangements with his/her employer.

In the attendance time information, you can add your analyzer's commute duration (before and after).

You can find and adapt some template from the internet, or create something like it (with your signature):

DECLARATION OF ATTENDANCE .

We declare for the due purposes that the NAME OF THE ANALYTISING, CPF nº ..., attended the psychoanalysis session on XX/XX/XXXX, from XXh to XXh.

In witness whereof, I do hereby subscribe.

City, XX of month 20XX.

Fulano de Tal - Psychoanalyst

CPF or RG of the psychoanalyst

If you wish, insert the psychoanalyst's phone number or website.

Step 8: Can I join the health insurance plan?

Psychoanalytic care is, as a rule, private, and there is a great demand for this type of care, as long as the psychoanalyst acts seriously, keeps up to date with his own personal analysis, is supervised by a more experienced psychoanalyst, and continues to study through courses and readings.

There is no universal rule applicable to all plans. What we find is that:

• Most famous health plans or medical insurance plans with national reach do not accept psychoanalysts, except if they are a psychologist or a professional in a field that the plan accepts; in this case, the service will be related to another profession, not psychoanalysis.
• Health plans or medical insurance with a local or regional scope may or may not accept psychoanalysts.

We remind you that to accept psychoanalysts or not is a liberality of each plan. There is no national law that obliges health plans to accept psychoanalysts. Some plans offer their clients psychologist services, others both.

As a rule, the health insurance plans offer only psychology services Then the psychoanalyst who wants to work with most health insurance companies would also need to be trained as a psychologist.

What we recommend is that the psychoanalyst should not depend on this kind of plan to act.

By following the tripod of psychoanalysis, becoming a better psychoanalyst every day, and doing your best with your analisands, the referral process will occur almost naturally.

Fixed and variable costs of your practice

Before you start a psychoanalysis clinic, you must evaluate how much you will spend and how much you will receive, that is, evaluate the revenues and costs/expenses. This way you will calculate your net profit (the amount you will have left after paying the costs and expenses). Many new entrepreneurs get lost in the finances and get into debt, which is very bad. So, plan how much youwill charge per consultation and what your fixed costs will be.

If your income is lower than your expenses, consider participating in shared environments, where the expenses are lower. Or, even, keep the service in your home. But, remember: privacy is essential!

It is good to remember that a room exclusively yours can bring fixed costs such as rent, water, electricity, internet, IPTU, condominium, maintenance, and reception services. Some commercial buildings have a shared reception ("concierge"), so you don't necessarily have to start your practice with a fixed cost of your own reception.

Understand the difference between:

• fixed costs and expenses : are those that, whether you have a patient or not, you will need to pay (for example, the monthly rent of an office exclusively yours);
• variable costs : these are costs that will only exist if you have patients (for example, the hourly rent in a coworking facility, as long as you don't hire a package with unused hours, but only the hours you are with scheduled patients).

The secret of cost reduction is to try to cut fixed costs as much as possible.

Set up a cozy and pleasant psychoanalysis clinic

To make your patients feel comfortable, it is important that the environment where the sessions will take place is cozy and quiet. Therefore, use the color technique: the more neutral they are, the less sensations will be imposed and the cozier the environment will be.

Your patient cannot be listening to loud noises from outside, nor can he think that people outside are listening to what he is saying.

For example, lamps, flowers, rugs, etc. Remember that your patient should not feel "bombarded" by information, as this may alter the course of the session.

From when can you start practicing as a psychoanalyst?

Historically (since Freud), the main thinkers of psychoanalysis have advocated a non-institutionalization of psychoanalysis There is a "legality" in the general legal sense (any abusive action against someone makes the aggressor responsible) and also because the law lists psychoanalysis as an authorized "craft" in Brazil. It works this way in Brazil and in most of the world.

Also, there is an internal ethic in the sense that in order to be a psychoanalyst, you have to:

• completing a Psychoanalysis Training Course, such as ours;
• keep studying, being supervised, and doing personal analysis if you are attending (psychoanalytic tripod);
• follow an ethic of not performing an inadequate countertransference, all of this seen in the course and worked on by the psychoanalyst in his own personal analysis and supervision.

A difference between craft and profession is that:

• Craft : it is free to act like any other profession (so, a person who has a law degree, for example, can be a psychoanalyst).
• Profession : it is limited only to those who have completed a specific college degree in a particular field and usually has professional oversight boards.

Psychoanalysts prefer psychoanalysis to remain a craft.

To become a psychoanalyst, it is necessary to have completed a training course based on theory, supervision and analysis. When you complete our online Training Course in Clinical Psychoanalysis, you will already be able to become a Psychoanalyst! Furthermore, you will not be obliged to join any entity, since there is no professional council or obligation to pay annual dues in the area of Psychoanalysis.

Once you have earned your certificate, you will be able to look for a good place to set up your psychoanalysis clinic! Upon completing our Course, you will be able to remain affiliated with our Institute, if you wish, with the advanced courses and supervision we offer to trained psychoanalysts.

After you graduate, keep studying (theory), being supervised (supervision), and being a patient of another psychoanalyst (personal analysis).

What if you are not interested in opening a clinic?

Even though you like the subject, you may not want to practice: because you have another profession, or because you decide to postpone starting your practice. Even so, Psychoanalysis will definitely change the way you see yourself, relationships, and behaviors!

Psychoanalysis is a differential for professionals who deal with people: teaching, administration, law, health, journalism, business, arts, etc. Besides, Psychoanalysis is the most relevant interpretative science of human existence, of self-knowledge and of behavioral phenomena. Without a doubt, no human science has been more decisive in the last 120 years than Psychoanalysis.

What does a Psychoanalyst do?

As a Psychoanalyst, you will not be able to prescribe medication (reserved to doctors) nor adopt other approaches to psychology (reserved to psychologists). By following the method of psychoanalysis that you will learn in our On-Line Training Course in Clinical Psychoanalysis, you will be able to be a professional Psychoanalyst.

The profession of Psychoanalyst is recognized by the Ministry of Labor and Employment / CBO 2515.50, of 09/02/02, by the Federal Council of Medicine (Consultation No. 4.048/97), by the Federal Public Ministry (Opinion 309/88), and by the Ministry of Health (Notice 257/57).

Did you like the article? Leave a comment about what your ideal psychoanalysis clinic would be like! Do you want to be a psychoanalyst? Then enroll in our 100% online Clinical Psychoanalysis course. With it, you will be able to practice!

Click here, to see a complete list of the activities authorized by Law for the profession of Psychoanalyst .

This article about setting up a psychoanalysis office, that is, setting up a psychoanalytic clinic, was written by Paulo Vieira He is the content manager of the Psychoanalysis Training Course at IBPC.