At Mulqueen Disability Law, a growing number of our clients living with mental health disabilities—depression, anxiety, PTSD, bipolar disorder, trauma-related conditions, OCD, and more—tell us the same thing:

“The insurance company is making my mental health worse.”

And they’re right.

While insurers are legally entitled to request medical updates to assess an LTD claim, many go far beyond what is reasonable. For people already experiencing debilitating psychological symptoms, the insurer’s conduct often becomes:

• intrusive
  
• destabilizing
  
• retraumatizing
  
• counter-therapeutic
  
• and in some cases, harmful enough to delay recovery
  

This is not simply an inconvenience. For many clients, the constant pressure, threats, and demands become a significant barrier to healing, and ironically, the insurer’s behaviour becomes a contributing factor to ongoing disability.

This article explores the issue we see every day: how insurance companies unintentionally (or sometimes quite knowingly) worsen mental health conditions—and what you can do to protect yourself.

How Insurer Conduct Can Exacerbate Mental Health Symptoms

If you live with a mental health condition, you know that stress, unpredictability, pressure, and conflict can intensify symptoms dramatically. Unfortunately, these are built into the way many insurers manage LTD claims.

Here are the patterns we see most often.

1. Frequent, repetitive demands for medical updates

Many of our clients report requests for medical updates every 30–60 days—even when:

• their condition is chronic
  
• their providers have clearly indicated they need long-term treatment
  
• there is no expected improvement in the near term
  
• disability is well documented
  

This places enormous pressure on patients and their healthcare providers. It also forces individuals with anxiety or depression into repeated appointments, paperwork, and conversations about their illness that can be emotionally taxing.

This issue comes up often in our practice. You can read more about general LTD claim challenges on our Long-Term Disability Lawyers page.

2. Repeated telephone calls and “check-ins”

Many clients receive unscheduled calls from case managers who expect detailed updates on:

• symptoms
  
• medications
  
• daily functioning
  
• treatment
  
• future plans
  

For someone with anxiety, trauma, or panic disorder, each unexpected call can trigger spirals of fear, worry, or shame. Some clients feel interrogated. Others feel judged or disbelieved.

When clients tell us, “I dread seeing my phone ring,” that is a sign the insurer’s management is harming their health.

3. Mandatory assessments and independent medical examinations (IMEs)

Insurers sometimes require:

• psychiatric IMEs
  
• psychological assessments
  
• functional capacity evaluations
  
• neurocognitive testing
  

These assessments are often lengthy, intrusive, and exhausting. They can force clients to re-live trauma or defend their illness to an evaluator who has only met them once.

We have seen IMEs aggravate PTSD symptoms, trigger depressive episodes, and cause significant anxiety relapses.

4. Premature rehabilitation or return-to-work pressure

Many insurers promote “early intervention” or “rehabilitation” programs as if they are supportive. But for people with serious mental health conditions, early RTW pressure can be harmful, unrealistic, and destabilizing.

Clients frequently report:

• feeling coerced into participating
  
• being told they “must try”
  
• being warned that refusal could jeopardize benefits
  

But mental health recovery does not follow a quick or linear timeline. For many, premature RTW attempts lead to setbacks, increased symptoms, or total collapse.

We discuss this dynamic in our article on the “Any Occupation” test (scroll for article), where insurers often push claimants into work too soon.

5. Threats, ultimatums, and adversarial communication

Some clients receive letters warning that:

• benefits may be terminated
  
• there is “insufficient objective evidence”
  
• treatment is “not aggressive enough”
  
• they “must comply” with assessments
  
• their file is being reviewed for closure
  

For someone already struggling with depression or PTSD, this can feel like emotional ambush.

Many of our clients tell us:

“I feel worse every time I hear from the insurer.”

When this happens repeatedly, it is not just stressful—it is a barrier to recovery.

6. Surveillance and monitoring

Surveillance—whether digital, in-person, or via social media—has a particularly harmful effect on mental health claimants.

It often leads to:

• heightened anxiety
  
• hypervigilance
  
• paranoia symptoms
  
• fear of leaving the house
  
• worsening depression
  

We address this in our blog article on How Insurers Use Surveillance in LTD Claims (scroll for article). For claimants already vulnerable, surveillance can severely undermine therapeutic progress.

Why Mental Health Claims Are Especially Vulnerable

Unlike physical conditions with visible symptoms or imaging results, mental health conditions often rely on:

• clinical observations
  
• self-reported symptoms
  
• functional limitations
  
• treatment history
  

Insurers, unfortunately, sometimes question these aspects more aggressively, leading to:

• disbelief
  
• invalidation
  
• unfair expectations
  
• demands for “objective evidence” that doesn’t exist
  

This tends to push claimants into defensive mode, which is emotionally draining and incompatible with healing.

We also explore these systemic issues in our Millennials and Long-Term Disability article, which touches on how mental health conditions are commonly minimized in the claims process.

The Emotional Toll: What Clients Tell Us

Here are some real experiences we hear (with identifying details removed):

• “I feel like the insurer is gaslighting me.”
  
• “Every time they ask for more updates, I spiral.”
  
• “My therapy progress disappears the moment I get a letter from them.”
  
• “The stress of dealing with them is worse than my illness.”
  
• “I’ve started having panic attacks every time I check my email.”
  

At a certain point, the insurer’s conduct becomes not merely unpleasant, but clinically harmful.

What You Can Do to Protect Your Mental Health

There are several steps we regularly recommend.

1. Limit direct communication

You have the right to communicate in writing rather than by phone. Written communication provides:

• clearer boundaries
  
• reduced anxiety
  
• a written record
  
• fewer unexpected intrusions
  

If phone calls trigger symptoms, you can request that all communications be in writing.

2. Ask your healthcare provider to set reasonable update intervals

Your treatment provider can write a letter stating:

• the recommended frequency of updates
  
• the chronic or long-term nature of the condition
  
• why frequent updates may be harmful
  
• that premature RTW is not medically appropriate
  

This carries weight.

3. Bring us in early

When Mulqueen Disability Law steps in, the insurer’s tone and behaviour typically change quickly. We take over communication, which:

• shields you from stress
  
• reduces emotional overwhelm
  
• ensures medical evidence is presented accurately
  
• prevents unreasonable demands
  
• allows you to focus on recovery
  

Many clients tell us that simply removing themselves from direct communication improves their mental health dramatically.

4. Know your rights

You do not have to:

• attend multiple IMEs back-to-back
  
• participate in premature rehabilitation programs
  
• speak to your insurer by phone
  
• provide updates more frequently than medically appropriate
  
• tolerate threats or intimidation
  

If any of this is happening, we can intervene on your behalf.

You Don’t Have to Do This Alone

If the insurer’s behaviour is making your mental health worse, prolonging your recovery, or causing you to feel unsafe, overwhelmed, or destabilized, it’s time to get help.

We can:

• step between you and the insurer
  
• manage communication
  
• gather supportive medical evidence
  
• push back on unreasonable demands
  
• protect your rights
  
• reduce your stress
  
• and help you move toward actual recovery

Mulqueen Disability Law specializes in hard-to-prove long-term disability claims for “Invisible Conditions” such as mental illness (depression, anxiety, PTSD) and chronic conditions (pain, neurological, immunological, concussion, post-COVID)  Contact us for a free confidential consultation.

Mulqueen Disability Law is a boutique law firm, focused on litigating long-term disability insurance benefit claims. Courtney Mulqueen and her team of legal professionals are Trauma-Informed Certified and have over two decades of experience exclusively in the area of long-term disability law. She and her team draw on their “insider” experience working for the insurance companies (including, Canada Life, Sun Life, Manulife, and OTIP), that they now sue for their clients.  

The preceding is not intended to be legal advice. This blog is made available for educational purposes only as well as to give you general information and a general understanding of the law, not to provide specific legal advice. By using this blog, you understand that there is no solicitor client relationship between you and the blog publisher. The blog should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a licensed lawyer in your jurisdiction. If your disability claim has been denied and you require legal advice, please contact a lawyer specializing in disability law.