Is Prosper Health Legit?

“Is Prosper Health legit?” The short answer: yes, Prosper Health is a legitimate company dedicated to filling the gap in autism-affirming mental health care for adults. I spent a great deal of time researching this question myself last year, and I hope my experience can help you make your own conclusion and connect to the resources you are looking for.  

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When I first found Prosper Health, I was 27 and hadn’t yet been diagnosed with autism. I had looked for mental health resources for autistic adults before, but always came up with little to show for it. With limited reviews and testimonials from other sources about Prosper Health, at the time in only its first year of operation, I was hesitant.

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Trustworthiness is a critical part of healthcare, especially for medically disenfranchised communities. Seeking care myself, I was worried about wasting time with poor quality, ill-informed care, and even worse, of being scammed.

Now offering services across the majority of the United States, Prosper is the first telehealth provider tailored specifically to the needs and experiences of autistic and neurodivergent adults. This model promises to expand the shallow pool of resources and services for autistic adults.

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When I was pursuing a diagnosis—a journey that in total took me around five or six years—I encountered many practices and providers that only worked with children. The few I found that did evaluate adults seemed either not to take insurance, not accept new patients, or have regressive beliefs about autism, in particular about how it manifests in adult women. Finding and contacting providers was an enormous, time-consuming research project that bore no fruit and left me feeling scorned

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I’m not alone in this experience. Countless autistic adults have shared similar stories of trying and failing to get evaluated, and for good reason—a staggering 84% of US counties lack any diagnostic resources, for autistic adults and children alike.  A UK study documents another phenomenon that many of us have experienced: across a small group of interviewees who were diagnosed with autism as adults, the average wait time reported between contacting a healthcare professional and receiving a diagnosis was 1.7 years.

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The stunning dearth of diagnostic resources  isn’t the only driver of the crisis in access to resources for autistic adults which Prosper Health is working to address. People with marginalized identities, particularly Black folks, bigger-bodied folks, and disabled folks, experience untenable mistreatment and diminishment by healthcare providers. As a (relatively) young, queer, autistic woman, I’ve had medical providers dismiss my concerns and invalidate my experiences more times than I could ever count. This is true as well for so many other autistic adults, who may hold other medically marginalized identities that intersect with their neurodivergence, and who are regularly disbelieved and belittled in medical settings on account of their autistic traits alone—especially by mental healthcare providers.

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Mistreatment by medical providers isn’t the only barrier placed between autistic people and healthcare. In-office healthcare services are widely inaccessible to autistic people for a number of reasons; one study found that 80% of autistic adults reported it is difficult for them to visit a primary care doctor, compared to 37% of neurotypical respondents. In the same study, autistic adults cited their greatest barriers to accessing in-office care as difficulty deciding if their symptoms warranted a doctor’s visit at all, difficulty making an appointment by phone, not feeling understood, challenges communicating with the doctor, and the sensory distress caused by waiting rooms.

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The cumulative effect of enduring these consistent challenges and abuses while attempting to access care can range from fatigue to distrust of healthcare institutions to severe medical trauma.

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So, I was skeptical when I first found Prosper Health on a Google search. Lacking a body of patient reviews and testimonials to peruse online, but also feeling some urgency around getting connected to appropriate supports, however, I decided to investigate Prosper Health myself.

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After reaching out to get started with Prosper Health, I was able to speak the same day with a practice manager, who offered thorough answers to my questions, matched me to a therapist, and helped me schedule my first session. Prosper Health has a network of licensed therapists who have training and experience working with autistic adults. Prosper therapists specialize in supporting clients through the diverse experiences and challenges that come with autism and neurodivergence, and their intersections with anxiety, depression, trauma, and other mental health and life challenges. They are neurodiversity affirming, rather than understanding autism through a deficit lens. Many Prosper Health therapists are neurodivergent themselves. 

I also scheduled an assessment for a formal autism diagnosis through Prosper Health. Prosper’s assessments differ from traditional autism evaluations because they rely entirely on telehealth, an innovative model eliminating the many barriers autistic adults confront to in-office care. Assessments are conducted by experienced psychologists—the provider who evaluated me shared that the majority of her therapy clients are autistic adults—and employ trusted, clinically tested assessment tools adapted specifically for telehealth. Patients receive the same comprehensive assessment they would in person, without the challenges of an in-person appointment.

Importantly, Prosper Health also accepts most major insurance plans, eliminating another frequent barrier to accessing autism assessments and high-quality therapy. Prosper is currently in-network with insurance in several parts of the US, and is constantly working to expand insurance coverage to make services more widely accessible.

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I also found the cost of services, especially assessments, very reasonable compared to the same services with other practices and providers. For those with insurance plans with high deductibles and high coinsurance, those paying out-of-pocket, or those using secondary plans or out-of-network benefits for reimbursements, this can make the difference between a prohibitive out-of-pocket cost and a manageable one. Prosper also offers payment plans for assessments, further diminishing barriers to care for autistic adults.

The prospect of expanding access to assessments and autism-affirming therapy has enormous implications for generations of autistic adults. A diagnosis doesn’t make an autistic person’s experience more valid than that of someone who hasn’t been diagnosed. However, while some autistic individuals are able to understand, navigate, and fulfill their needs without a formal diagnosis, receiving a diagnosis can be illuminating for many others.

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Diagnoses can lead to a deeper understanding of one’s lived experience, and, paired with relevant resources and individual therapy, can support in adapting tools and strategies to manage the challenges that can come with autistic life and help us thrive. For me, getting diagnosed has been instrumental in forging the path towards self-compassion and self-advocacy.

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Overall, my experience with Prosper Health and its providers has been that they are legitimate, professional, and convicted in the mission to help more autistic adults move through the world with supports tailored to each of our unique needs.