Committee hears testimony on making play therapy a separate Medicaid service

The House Human Services Committee took testimony on "An act relating to Medicaid coverage for play therapy" (age 58), hearing from a clinical graduate student and a longtime child psychologist about whether play therapy should be recognized and billed separately under Medicaid.

Committee members said the bill would ask whether play therapy should be a stand-alone, billable Medicaid service rather than remain an element within the broader psychotherapy benefit. That question matters for clinical practice, documentation and reimbursement for children served by Medicaid.

Christina Snook, a clinical mental health graduate student at Vermont State University, told the committee she has worked more than 20 years in public schools and is studying play therapy. "Play therapy gets a bad rap because of the nature of the word play. We think it's an unstructured thing," she said, adding that "it is children's language" and "a therapist who's fluent in this language, can provide effective evidence based support to children in our state who are served by Medicaid." She said play therapy can treat children experiencing trauma, parental separation and divorce, homelessness and parental substance use disorder, and argued it expands access to…