Policies

“The Therapist Brief,” may be referred to as “we,” “us,” or “our” in The Therapist Brief’s policies. This page contains our AI, Clinical Use & Content Policy and our Terms of Service, followed by our Privacy Policy. By creating an account, subscribing, or checking the box presented at signup or checkout, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the site or the publication.

1. AI-Generated Content and Its Limitations

The Therapist Brief is produced with the assistance of artificial intelligence, including large language models, used to help identify, summarize, and draft research briefs. Human review is part of our process, but you should assume that AI has contributed to the material you read.

AI systems can and do make mistakes. Because of how these systems work, AI-generated material has limitations you should keep in mind every time you read a brief:

• Factual errors and “hallucinations.” AI can state things that are inaccurate, incomplete, or entirely fabricated — including study findings, statistics, quotations, citations, author names, and dates — while sounding confident and authoritative.
• Misrepresented research. A summary may oversimplify, omit important caveats, or misstate the methods, population, effect size, or conclusions of the underlying study.
• Out-of-date information. Briefs reflect sources available at the time of writing and may not capture newer research, retractions, corrections, or changes in clinical guidance.
• Missing context. AI does not know your client, your setting, your jurisdiction, or your scope of practice, and cannot account for the clinical nuance those require.
• Bias. AI output can reflect biases present in its training data or sources.

Treat each brief as a starting point that points you toward the literature — not as a verified, authoritative, or final source. Before you rely on any statement for a clinical, academic, supervisory, or professional purpose, independently verify it against the cited primary source and current, authoritative guidance, and apply your own professional judgment.

2. Crisis & Emergency Resources

The Therapist Brief does not provide crisis intervention, emergency services, or direct mental health care, and does not monitor the site or inbox for emergencies. If you or someone you know is in crisis or may be in danger:

• Call 911 (or your local emergency number) for an immediate, life-threatening emergency.
• Call or text 988 — the U.S. Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (24/7).
• Text HOME to 741741 — the Crisis Text Line (24/7).
• Outside the United States, contact your local emergency services or a regional crisis line.

3. Not Medical or Clinical Advice

All content published by The Therapist Brief — on this site, in our emails, and in any related materials — is provided for general educational and informational purposes for licensed, pre-licensed, or supervised mental health professionals only.

• It is not medical, psychological, psychiatric, clinical, diagnostic, therapeutic, legal, financial, or supervisory advice.
• It is not a substitute for professional evaluation, diagnosis, treatment, clinical supervision, consultation, or the independent judgment of a qualified professional.
• It does not establish a clinician–patient, therapist–client, physician–patient, or supervisor–supervisee relationship between you and The Therapist Brief or anyone associated with it.
• It is not a recommendation to diagnose, assess, or treat any individual, or to use, adopt, or avoid any specific assessment, intervention, modality, medication, or course of action.
• It is not intended for, or directed to, clients, patients, or the general public seeking personal mental health care.

Nothing in our content should be used to diagnose or treat any person. If you are a member of the public seeking help, please consult a licensed professional or use the crisis resources in Section 2 above.

4. Professional Responsibility & No PHI

You are a licensed, pre-licensed, or supervised mental health professional and remain solely responsible for your own clinical decisions. You agree that:

• You will exercise independent professional judgment and will not act on our content without verifying it and confirming it is appropriate for your client, setting, and scope of practice.
• You are responsible for complying with the laws, regulations, licensing-board rules, payer requirements, and professional and ethical codes (for example, those of the APA, ACA, NASW, AAMFT, or your own licensing body) that apply to you.
• You will not submit, post, or transmit client protected health information (PHI) or other confidential client information to us. The Therapist Brief is a publication, not a HIPAA-covered service, electronic health record, or treatment platform, and is not an appropriate place to store or discuss identifiable client details.

The Therapist Brief is not a covered entity or business associate under HIPAA, and no business associate agreement is offered, provided, or implied. Any client information you submit to us in violation of this section is submitted at your own risk and outside any HIPAA-protected relationship.

5. Accuracy, Currency & Sources

We aim to summarize research faithfully and to point to credible primary sources, but we do not warrant that any brief is accurate, complete, current, or free of error. Research evolves, and findings may be superseded, qualified, corrected, or retracted after publication. Where a brief references a study or source, that primary source — not our summary — is authoritative, and you should consult it directly before relying on it.

Each briefing is a summary, not the underlying research itself. Where available, our email briefings include links to the original studies, articles, or sources a brief discusses. These links are provided so you can access the full research directly, and you should follow them and review the complete primary source — including its methods, sample, limitations, and conclusions — before relying on any point from a brief for a clinical, academic, supervisory, or professional purpose. We do not control third-party sources: some may require a subscription, login, or institutional access, and links may change, move, or become unavailable over time.

Ownership of underlying research. The studies, articles, and other sources our briefs summarize are the work of their respective authors and publishers. The Therapist Brief does not own, claim authorship of, or take credit for that underlying research, and our summaries are not endorsed by, affiliated with, or approved by the researchers, journals, or publishers they reference. All trademarks, publication names, and copyrighted works referenced remain the property of their respective owners, and are referenced for identification and commentary purposes only. Our intellectual-property rights extend only to our own original summaries, commentary, selection, arrangement, text, design, and branding — not to any underlying source.

6. Terms of Service

License to our content. We grant you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to access and read our content for your own professional and educational use. Our briefs, text, design, and branding are protected by intellectual-property laws. You may share individual briefs with colleagues for non-commercial professional purposes with attribution, but you may not republish, resell, scrape, redistribute at scale, train machine-learning models on, or create derivative commercial products from our content without our prior written permission.

Acceptable use. You agree not to misuse the site or service, including by attempting to disrupt or gain unauthorized access to our systems, using automated means to harvest content beyond normal reading, submitting unlawful or infringing material, submitting client PHI, or using our content in any way that violates applicable law or professional or ethical obligations.

Accounts, suspension, and termination. You are responsible for the accuracy of the information you provide and for keeping access to your subscription email account secure. We may suspend or terminate your access, or decline to provide the service, if we reasonably believe you have violated these terms, misused the service, or created risk or legal exposure for us. You may stop using the service and cancel your subscription at any time. Sections of these terms that by their nature should survive termination (including intellectual-property, disclaimer, liability, indemnification, and dispute provisions) survive it.

Beta features. From time to time we may offer beta or early-access features or editions. Beta features are provided for evaluation, may change or be discontinued at any time without notice, and are provided “as is” to an even greater degree than the rest of the service. If you give us feedback on the service or a beta feature, you grant us a perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free license to use that feedback without restriction or compensation.

Third-party content and links. Briefs reference and may link to third-party research, publishers, and resources. We do not control and are not responsible for third-party content, and a reference or link does not imply our endorsement.

7. Subscriptions, Billing & Refunds

Some tiers of The Therapist Brief are free; others are paid subscriptions.

• Pricing. The price, billing frequency, and features of each paid tier are stated at checkout before you subscribe.
• Automatic renewal. Paid subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period at the then-current price for your tier, and your payment method will be charged at each renewal, until you cancel. By subscribing, you authorize these recurring charges.
• How to cancel. You may cancel at any time through the subscription management link in any paid-tier email or on your subscription preferences page. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current billing period; you keep access until then.
• Price changes. If we change the price of your tier, we will notify you by email at least 30 days before the change takes effect, and it will apply from your next renewal. If you do not agree, cancel before the renewal.
• Refunds. Except where required by law, payments are non-refundable and we do not provide credits for partial billing periods.
• Payment processing. Payments are processed by Stripe. We do not store full card numbers.
• Taxes. Prices may be exclusive of applicable taxes, which will be shown at checkout where required.

8. No Warranty (“As Is”)

The website, the publication, and all content are provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, whether express, implied, or statutory, to the fullest extent permitted by law. We expressly disclaim all implied warranties, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, accuracy, non-infringement, and any warranty that the content is error-free, complete, current, or suitable for any clinical, diagnostic, academic, or professional purpose. No advice or information you obtain from us creates any warranty not expressly stated here.

9. Limitation of Liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, The Therapist Brief and its owners, contributors, and service providers will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, data, goodwill, or other intangible losses, arising out of or relating to your use of, or inability to use, the site, the publication, or its content — including any decision made or action taken in reliance on AI-generated or other material we publish — whether based in contract, tort, negligence, strict liability, or any other legal theory, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such damages. To the extent liability cannot be excluded, our total aggregate liability arising out of or relating to the service is limited to the greater of the amount you paid us, if any, for the service in the twelve months before the claim, or USD $100. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations, so some of the above may not apply to you.

10. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold harmless The Therapist Brief, and their owners, contributors, and service providers from any third-party claims, damages, liabilities, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of: your breach of these terms; your unlawful or unauthorized use of the content or service; your submission of client PHI or confidential information; your infringement or misuse of intellectual property; your scraping or unauthorized redistribution of content; or your violation of applicable law or professional or ethical obligations.

11. Governing Law & Disputes

These terms and any dispute arising out of or relating to them or the service are governed by the laws of the State of New York, United States, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules, and you agree to the exclusive jurisdiction of the state and federal courts located in the State of New York for any such dispute, except where applicable law provides otherwise. Nothing in this section deprives you of mandatory consumer protections of the jurisdiction where you reside.

12. General

• Entire agreement. These terms, together with the Privacy Policy and any terms presented at checkout, are the entire agreement between you and us regarding the service and supersede prior agreements on that subject.
• Severability. If any provision of these terms is held unenforceable, it will be enforced to the maximum extent permissible and the remaining provisions will remain in full effect.
• No waiver. Our failure to enforce any provision is not a waiver of our right to enforce it later.
• Assignment. You may not assign or transfer these terms or your subscription without our written consent. We may assign these terms in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, with notice to you.
• Notices. We may provide notices to the email address associated with your subscription.

13. Changes to These Terms

We may update these terms from time to time. The effective date at the top of this page reflects the latest version. For material changes, we will notify subscribers by email or by a prominent notice on the site before the change takes effect, and — for paid subscribers — material changes will apply no earlier than your next renewal. Your continued use of the site or publication after a change takes effect means you accept the updated terms.

14. Contact

Questions about these policies can be sent to [email protected] or through our contact page. See also our Privacy Policy below.

Effective date: 8/2/2026

This Privacy Policy describes how The Therapist Brief, the publisher of The Therapist Brief, collects, uses, and shares personal information. The Therapist Brief is operated from the United States and is directed to mental health professionals in the United States.

Information We Collect

We may collect the following information when you use the site, sign up, manage preferences, apply for beta access, subscribe, or respond to a brief survey:

• Email address and, if provided, name or practice information.
• Subscription tier, beta status, topic preferences, and account settings.
• Email delivery, open, click, unsubscribe, and survey-response data.
• Payment and subscription status from our payment processor. We do not store full card numbers.
• Basic technical information such as IP address, browser details, timestamps, and error logs, collected for security, troubleshooting, and abuse prevention.
• Cookieless pageview analytics. When you load a page on this site, your browser sends a first-party request to our own API recording the page path, the host name of the referring site (not the full referring URL), and any utm_source, utm_medium, or utm_campaign tags present in the link you arrived through. This beacon sets no cookies and does not use or store any identifier tied to you. IP addresses appear transiently in infrastructure logs but are not linked to pageview records. We use this data only to understand which pages and campaigns bring people to the site.

How We Use Information

We use information to operate The Therapist Brief, deliver selected research briefs, manage subscriptions and payments, improve the publication, troubleshoot service issues, secure the service and prevent abuse, and comply with legal obligations.

We Do Not Sell Your Information

We do not sell personal information, and we do not share personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising. We do not use third-party advertising or tracking cookies on this site.

Service Providers

We use trusted service providers to operate the service, including email delivery, hosting, analytics or logging, payment processing, and infrastructure providers. These providers may process information only as needed to provide their services to us, under agreements that restrict their use of it.

Examples include Resend for email delivery, Cloudflare for static site hosting (Cloudflare Pages) and API infrastructure (Cloudflare Workers), and Stripe for payments. We may also disclose information if required by law, to protect our rights or the safety of others, or in connection with a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets (in which case this policy will continue to apply to previously collected information or you will be notified of changes).

Email Surveys

Brief emails may include optional rating questions. When you select a rating, we store the selected value, subscriber identifier, brief identifier, timestamp, and source so we can understand whether briefs are useful and improve future editions.

Retention

We keep information only as long as reasonably necessary to operate the service, maintain records, resolve disputes, improve the publication, and satisfy legal or accounting obligations. When information is no longer needed for those purposes, we delete or de-identify it.

Your Choices & Rights

• Unsubscribe. You may unsubscribe from emails using the unsubscribe link in any brief.
• Access, correction, deletion. You may request access to, correction of, or deletion of your personal information by contacting us at [email protected]. We will respond within the time required by applicable law. Some records may be retained where required for security, legal, accounting, or operational reasons.
• Do Not Track / Global Privacy Control. Because we do not track visitors across other sites and do not sell or share personal information, our site does not respond differently to “Do Not Track” or Global Privacy Control browser signals — there is no cross-site tracking to opt out of.
• State privacy rights. Depending on where you live, you may have additional rights under state privacy laws (such as the California Consumer Privacy Act), including the rights to know, correct, and delete personal information and the right not to be discriminated against for exercising them. You may exercise these rights using the contact above.

International Visitors

The service is hosted in the United States and directed to U.S. professionals. If you access it from outside the United States, your information will be transferred to and processed in the United States, where privacy laws may differ from those of your jurisdiction. If you are in a jurisdiction (such as the EEA or UK) whose law requires a legal basis for processing, we process your information to perform our agreement with you (delivering the publication you subscribed to), for our legitimate interests in operating, securing, and improving the service, and to comply with legal obligations; you may contact us at [email protected] to exercise any rights available to you under that law.

Security

We use reasonable technical and organizational safeguards to protect information. No internet service can guarantee absolute security.

Children

The Therapist Brief is intended for adult professionals. It is not directed to anyone under 18, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you believe a child has provided us personal information, contact us and we will delete it.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this policy from time to time. The effective date at the top reflects the latest version. If we make material changes to how we collect or use personal information, we will notify subscribers by email or by a prominent notice on the site before the change takes effect.

Contact

Privacy questions and requests: [email protected], or through our contact page.