Confidential therapy for business aviation pilots and crew.
Pilots carry responsibility for every life on board, an unforgiving schedule across time zones, and a well-founded fear that seeking help could ground their career, so many say nothing at all. CEREVITY gives a flight department or operator a confidential, private-pay therapy benefit for its pilots and crew, matched by hand and delivered so that nothing routes through the operator health plan.
What CEREVITY is.
A nationwide network of independent licensed clinicians, offered as a confidential benefit for a department's pilots and crew.
CEREVITY is a nationwide network of independent licensed clinicians providing private-pay therapy by secure telehealth across all 50 states. It is not an app, not a coaching marketplace, and not an employee assistance program. Each pilot is matched by hand to a clinician who understands high-responsibility, high-scrutiny work, and keeps that clinician over time.
For the operator, the model is simple to reason about. Care is private-pay with no insurance claim filed, so nothing routes through the operator health plan and no claim record is created. The benefit sits above any existing EAP rather than replacing it, aimed at the pilots and crew whose steadiness carries the operation.
CEREVITY runs the same structure for other high-responsibility populations, from emergency medicine groups to hospital systems. The business aviation version is built around the one thing that keeps pilots from care: the fear of disclosure.Why pilots and crew are different.
The reason pilots avoid help is not lack of need, and the standard benefit was not built to overcome it.
A pilot holds every life on board, works across broken sleep and time zones, and operates under a medical-certification regime that many believe punishes honesty about mental health. Care built for that reality is the focus of our work as a therapist for pilots.
The result is a population that manages symptoms quietly rather than risk being grounded, and the research reflects it.
of airline pilots met the threshold for depression in an anonymous survey, and underreporting is likely given the fear of being grounded. Source: Wu et al., Environmental Health, 2016 (anonymous web-based survey of 1,848 pilots).
This spans the industry, from major carriers to regional and charter operations, where the pressures are often sharper and the support thinner.
A generic EAP, designed for high-volume short-term employee support, is structurally mismatched to this population. Pilots rarely use it, both because the format does not fit and because they will not route anything about their mental health through a channel connected to their employer or their certificate. What actually reaches them looks nothing like a standard benefit: it is private, continuous, and disconnected from the operation. The need goes unmet quietly, which in aviation is the most dangerous way for it to go unmet.
What pilots and crew actually carry into the cockpit.
The presenting issues behind the professionalism, in the language of the flight deck.
The disclosure gap
The single biggest barrier is the belief that admitting a problem ends a career, so pilots stay silent. That gap is exactly what our work on the aviation mental health disclosure gap addresses.
The FAA gray zone
Pilots are often unsure what care they can seek without a reporting obligation, and uncertainty keeps them from starting. We map it in the therapy gray zone and what pilots can and cannot do.
Paying cash to stay private
Many pilots already pay out of pocket precisely to keep care off the record, which is a workaround CEREVITY makes the default. We cover the reasoning in why some pilots pay cash for therapy.
Time zones and the body clock
Crossing time zones and flying red-eyes wears down the recovery judgment depends on. This is the territory of circadian disruption in people who work against the clock.
The mind that will not stop
Irregular schedules and constant vigilance leave the body tired and the mind still running. Sleep is often the first thing to go, the subject of our work on chronic insomnia in high-vigilance professionals.
Burnout that hides
In a profession built on composure, burnout rarely announces itself and shows up in small changes first. Catching it early means knowing the hidden forms burnout takes in high performers.
What the industry got wrong
Aviation's approach to pilot mental health has often deterred the very disclosure it needs, a pattern examined in our piece on what the industry got wrong.
The weight of the lives aboard
Responsibility for every passenger is a load pilots are expected to carry without flinching, and over time it exacts a toll close to the moral weight carried by first responders.
In most jobs, staying silent about your mental health is a private cost. In this one, it is a safety issue.
Session formats built for duty schedules.
Three lengths, no rigid weekly slot.
The steady cadence of ongoing therapy. Most clients spend most of their care in 50-minute sessions.
For work that needs more room than a standard hour can hold. See 90-minute sessions.
For work that needs uninterrupted time to reach resolution. See 3-hour therapy intensives.
Care is delivered in 50-minute, 90-minute, and 3-hour sessions by secure telehealth, nationwide. A pilot can do focused work in a single 90-minute or 3-hour block on a day off rather than forcing a standing weekly appointment that a trip will break. Modality is matched at intake rather than assigned, and the pilot keeps the same clinician throughout. When the situation is urgent, same-week access is the norm rather than the exception.
Give crews a channel they will actually use.
A confidential conversation about a crew wellbeing benefit takes one call. Nothing about it touches the operator health plan.
Start a partnership conversationHow a pilot is matched.
Every pilot is matched by hand, not by an algorithm running against an intake form. Matching is reviewed by CEREVITY's clinical leadership, with the pilot's schedule, role, and preferences weighed before any introduction is made.
The eligible individual submits a confidential intake form covering presenting issues, modality preference, professional context, and scheduling parameters. Operated by CEREVITY directly, not by a broker.
Intake is reviewed by CEREVITY's clinical leadership against the network's active capacity, current licensure footprint, and modality availability. This is the step that does not exist in an EAP. You can review the clinicians in the network directly.
A specific clinician is matched to the pilot, who receives the match with the clinician's profile, modality, and credentials, plus a direct online scheduling link. If you are doing this for someone else, see how to find a therapist for your CEO.
Scheduling runs directly through CEREVITY infrastructure with no phone handoff. First sessions are typically scheduled within 5 to 10 business days of the match.
Care continues on the cadence the clinical work requires, in 50-minute, 90-minute, or 3-hour sessions, without an employer-imposed session cap.
Capability comparison for business aviation.
An evaluation framework on the dimensions that matter when scoping a crew wellbeing benefit. All three models have a place; they are built for different populations.
| Dimension | Typical EAP | Executive-tier platform | CEREVITY |
|---|---|---|---|
| Network model | Broker layer between employer and contractor roster | Single-vendor platform, W-2 or contracted pool | Independent clinical network with direct relationships |
| Clinician assignment | First contractor to reply with availability | Algorithmic matching on intake-form inputs | Clinical review by network leadership |
| Intake and scheduling | Phone handoff to the clinician's line | App-based intake and scheduling | Network-operated intake, direct online scheduling |
| Session formats | Standard 50-minute, capped session counts | Standard 45 to 50-minute sessions | 50-minute, 90-minute, and 3-hour formats, no cap |
| Clinical scope | Acute, broadly applicable concerns | Workforce-wide, executive tier as an upsell | Built around the presenting issues of pilots and crew |
| Modality fit | Generalist talk therapy | Generalist therapy with some specialty | CBT, DBT, psychodynamic, IFS, matched at intake |
| Reach | National via roster density | National telehealth, roster variance | All 50 states via telehealth |
| Payment model | Employer-sponsored, in network | Per-employee-per-month seat pricing | Private pay, out of network, partnership agreement |
| Operator visibility | Aggregate, broker-mediated | Vendor dashboards with engagement metrics | Administrative reporting only |
| Right fit for | Workforce-wide acute support | Mid-tier ongoing care with an executive add-on | business aviation, end to end |
If you are running a formal evaluation, our notes on what to look for in a private therapy provider cover the procurement side in detail.
What the operator sees, and what it does not.
For a crew benefit to work, the pilot has to trust that using it creates no visibility into their care, and no connection to their certificate or their employer. CEREVITY is built around that requirement.
- Confirmation that contracted services were provided to eligible individuals.
- Aggregate utilization at the partnership level, where contractually appropriate.
- Invoicing and eligibility reconciliation.
- Nothing tied to a specific named pilot's clinical content.
- Whether a specific named pilot has scheduled, attended, or engaged.
- What clinical issues are being addressed, or which clinician is assigned.
- Session notes, treatment plans, or diagnostic information.
- Any attendance detail at the individual level.
Clinicians are independent licensed professionals operating under their own licensure and the confidentiality and privacy obligations that attach to it. Protected health information is held within the clinical infrastructure, and the agreements governing it are defined in writing before the partnership goes live. Our notice of privacy practices and privacy policy are published in full.
Clinical records, session content, and individual engagement data sit inside the clinical platform. The administrative layer the partner interacts with is structurally separate from the clinical layer. Further context on why this matters to this population: private-pay therapy and confidentiality.
Eligibility lists are maintained on the partner side and confirmed at the point of intake. Administering eligibility does not require the partner to receive clinical information back.
A Business Associate Agreement is executed where the partnership structure requires it, and whether one applies is a determination made with counsel rather than assumed. The partnership agreement defines the administrative reporting scope in writing before anything goes live. See also our terms of service.
Pilots in particular ask about downstream exposure before they will engage at all. The question that comes up most is whether therapy shows up on a background check, and it is answered directly on our site.
What the first 30 days look like.
The hardest part of a aviation-tier partnership is not the contract. It is the period between signature and the first pilot in care.
A 60-minute kickoff with your team and CEREVITY's partnership lead. We confirm the partnership shape, the eligibility model, the administrative reporting scope, and the internal owner. The BAA, where applicable, is executed.
Your team provides the eligible-individual list. CEREVITY confirms it against the network and establishes the verification path at intake. Only eligibility confirmation flows forward.
CEREVITY provides a confidential, aviation-tier comms template explaining the benefit, the privacy posture, and how to access intake. It is written to be received without stigma, which matters given why discretion is the deciding factor for CEOs in the first place.
Eligible individuals begin intake on their own cadence. First sessions are typically scheduled within 5 to 10 business days. By day 30 the partnership is operational and a quarterly review cadence is in place.
The business case for the operator.
Crew retention, sustained performance, and safety culture are the levers, and in aviation the last of those is not optional.
Retention of crews
Trained pilots are scarce and expensive to replace, and a departure disrupts an entire schedule. Confidential clinical care reaches the pilots least likely to ask, and it is a concrete part of retaining high-value people.
Sustained performance
Focus, judgment, and steadiness degrade under chronic, unmanaged stress, and burnout's impact on productivity is measurable well before a crew member steps back. Care that addresses the underlying pattern keeps the operation running at the level it assumes.
Safety culture and recruiting
A channel crews will actually use strengthens the safety culture an operation depends on and signals seriousness to recruits, which is why some operators pair it with formal therapist referral programs.
Questions flight departments ask first.
Does this replace our existing EAP?
No. CEREVITY sits above the EAP as a confidential crew benefit. The EAP continues to serve the broader organization, while CEREVITY provides matched, ongoing clinical care that pilots will actually use because nothing routes through the operator or connects to their certificate. The point is reach, not duplication.
How is confidentiality protected for our pilots?
Care is private pay, so no insurance claim is filed and nothing routes through the operator health plan. There is no claim record for a benefits administrator, an insurer, or the operator to access. Sessions remain between the pilot and the licensed clinician, who is bound by their own licensure confidentiality obligations. Clinical decisions about certification remain between a pilot and their aviation medical examiner; CEREVITY does not report to anyone.
Which crew members are typically covered?
Scope is defined in the partnership agreement. Most operators cover their pilots and often extend it to cabin crew, dispatchers, and maintenance staff. The benefit is designed for the people who keep the operation safe, not a narrow subset.
Does CEREVITY advise pilots on FAA reporting?
CEREVITY provides confidential therapy; it does not make certification decisions or file anything with the FAA. Questions about what must be reported are between a pilot and their aviation medical examiner, and our clinicians work within that reality rather than around it. Nothing about engaging with CEREVITY is disclosed by us to any employer or regulator.
How quickly can a pilot be matched?
Once the partnership is in place, an individual pilot is matched by hand to an appropriate clinician, typically on a same-week basis depending on licensure footprint and modality fit. First sessions are usually scheduled within 5 to 10 business days of the match. Matching is reviewed by CEREVITY's clinical leadership rather than assigned algorithmically.
Does CEREVITY cover crews across multiple bases and states?
Yes. Care is delivered by secure telehealth nationwide across all 50 states, so a single partnership can support crews wherever they are based, and pilots keep the same clinician regardless of where a trip takes them.
What does it cost the operator?
Structure is agreed in the partnership conversation and depends on the number of crew covered and the scope of access. CEREVITY is a private-pay network with transparent fees, so there are no insurance-driven surprises in the accounting. Standard individual rates are published on our pricing page.
How do we begin?
Start a partnership conversation using the form on this page, by phone at (562) 295-6650, or through the contact page. A member of CEREVITY's clinical leadership will follow up directly and confidentially to scope a benefit that fits the operation.
Start a partnership conversation.
Tell us about your flight department or operation and the crews you want to cover. A member of CEREVITY's clinical leadership will follow up directly and confidentially.
Further reading and related partnerships.
Research, clinical writing, and the other populations CEREVITY supports.
Aviation research and writing
For flight departments
Clinical writing
A note on sources.
The figure that 12.6 percent of airline pilots met the threshold for depression, with underreporting likely given the fear of losing a medical certificate, is drawn from Wu and colleagues and summarized by the Flight Safety Foundation, based on an anonymous web-based survey of 1,848 pilots published in Environmental Health. The structural argument on this page is based on the firsthand experience of CEREVITY clinicians who work with aviators, combined with publicly available materials. Specific contractual scopes, including any Business Associate Agreement, are confirmed in writing in the partnership agreement before a partnership goes live. Additional CEREVITY research is collected in the knowledge base. If you or a colleague are in crisis, help is available at 988.
