Full Course Description

The Dance with Boundaries: Understanding the Top Ethical Challenges in Clinical Practice

Navigating boundaries is one of the biggest and most common challenges you’ll face as a clinician. Since every client is different, communicating and interacting one way may constitute a boundary crossing for one client but not another. Maintaining boundaries requires adaptability and vigilance. And yes, sometimes not maintaining proper boundaries puts our work—even our professional survival—at risk. It’s enough to make even the most confident clinician sweat. So when it comes to setting and establishing healthy boundaries, where do we begin? In this recording, you’ll learn about the most common boundary pitfalls and how to deal with them. You’ll also learn:

An ethical decision-making model for avoiding boundary violations
The role that culture plays in setting and expressing ethical boundaries
An ethical approach to doing teletherapy that ensures your safety as well as your clients’
How to communicate clear guidelines from the very first session that address the likelihood of a dual relationship and how you plan to navigate it

Program Information

Objectives

Determine how the Codes of Ethics applies to boundary setting in private practice/clinical practice.
Analyze ethical dilemmas clinicians face surrounding boundary setting with respect to utilizing technology with clients in clinical practice.
Catalogue best practices for avoiding boundary issues related to self-referral policies and procedures.
Utilize ethical practices to ensure client safety, maintain confidentiality and obtain informed consent when utilizing telemental health services.
Assess the ethical challenges that technology poses in a clinical setting.
Develop clear ethical guidelines to address the potential for a dual relationship with a client in a clinical setting.

Outline

SETTING THE STAGE FOR BEST PRACTICES
- Having a Code of Ethics to Follow
- Boundary Contexts and Why They Matter
- Setting up a Peer Group to Seek Counsel for Ethical Dilemmas
- The “Always Do No Harm to Your Clients” Rule
TOP BOUNDARY CHALLENGES AND ETHICAL TRAPS
- Self-Disclosure – A Slippery Slope
- Giving & Receiving Gifts
- Physical Contact & Proximity in Session
- Language Usage in Session
- Contact Outside of Sessions
- Minors & Parents
- Handling Clients Who Lack Boundary Skills
TECHNOLOGY AND BOUNDARIES
- Social Media – How to Avoid Ethical Issues
- Email, Texting & Phone Call Boundary Challenges
- Telehealth and the Impact on Boundaries
PRIVATE PRACTICE ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS & GRAY AREAS
- Impact of Isolation on Boundaries
- Why Private Practice Heightens All Boundary Concerns
- Policies & Procedures that Can Reduce Ethical Boundary Issues
DUAL RELATIONSHIPS (FRIENDS, FAMILY, STUDENTS, EMPLOYEES, BUSINESS, ACQUAINTANCE)
- Developing a Strategy for Dual Relationships
- Evaluate Your Ability to Handle the Dual Relationship at Hand
- Creating a Proper Treatment Plan that Assists with Boundary Concerns
- Top Mistakes Clinicians Make Regarding Dual Relationships
FINANCIAL & BUSINESS – NAVIGATING BOUNDARY ISSUES
- Self-Referral Policies & Procedures
- Collection Process for Nonpayment of fees
- Fee Establishing & Transparency Guidelines
- Sliding Scales & Bartering
- Confidentiality & Privacy Concerns

Target Audience

Psychologists
Physicians
Addiction Counselors
Counselors
Social Workers
Marriage & Family Therapists
Nurses
Other Behavioral Health Professionals

Copyright : 03/13/2022

The New Rules of Therapy: Ethics in the Modern World

No therapist wants to end up needing legal defense, but earning your ethics CEs doesn’t have to be a bore! In this recording, you’ll dig into the hand-wringing dilemmas surrounding today’s important ethical quandaries with an attorney who’s also a psychologist. Rather than merely focusing on defensive issues, you’ll learn the latest ways of keeping your license free and clear of complaints. You’ll also learn from real-life cases that highlight how to think about the legal and ethical considerations that inevitably pop up when doing the job you love. Understanding these rules is vital to striking a balance between legal requirements and effective clinical practice. You’ll discover how to:

Develop strategies to maintain proper clinical boundaries in emotionally laden cases, such as when working with children of divorce and treating high-conflict clients
Maintain good record-keeping practices that will benefit your practice and keep you out of court
Balance the use of emails, cell phones, and texting during the course of treatment
Recognize the appropriate use and inherent limitations of teletherapy

Program Information

Objectives

Analyze the sources of the legal and ethical rules that apply to mental health practice.
Appraise the most common areas of legal exposure associated with mental health practice.
Formulate the manner by which nonsexual boundary violations can affect good clinical practice and result in disciplinary proceedings.
Demonstrate how good record keeping practices can enhance continuity of care issues and provide a sound defense to allegations of wrongdoing.
Demonstrate how to navigate the clinical, ethical, and legal issues associated with the provision of electronic mental health practice.

Outline

Understanding the legal system associated with mental health practice
Clinical and ethical nonsexual boundary issues
How to decipher who is the patient
Clinical interventions with emotionally needy individuals
Adjunct use of email correspondence; personal cell phone numbers; text messaging
Professional contacts with attorneys affiliated with and clients
Current best record keeping practices and what constitutes the record
Permissible and mandated release of records
Electronic therapy post coronavirus and rules governing electronic therapy
Licensure issues and conducting electronic therapy across state lines

Target Audience

Psychologists
Physicians
Addiction Counselors
Counselors
Social Workers
Marriage & Family Therapists
Art Therapists
Nurses
Other Behavioral Health Professionals

Copyright : 03/10/2022

The Ethical Lives of Clients: What Therapists Can Offer

Clients regularly seek our input on a wide range of ethical dilemmas. Should they divorce? Cut off a difficult family member? Keep or reveal a family secret? End or continue an affair? Yet our field is largely silent on the role we ought to play in the ethical part of clients’ lives. Though it’s something we often already do in the privacy of sessions, how can we better embrace our roles as ethical consultants and develop actual skills in this area of practice? How can we help clients deepen their understanding of their ethical challenges, rather than reduce moral complexity to clinical clichés—like “do what feels right”—or the pretense that we always have the right answer for them? In this recording, you’ll discover how to:

Identify the wide range of ethical issues wrapped up in what clients bring to therapy
Describe how advances in moral psychology can apply to therapy
Recognize your own moral emotions and those of your clients
Develop skills in ethical consultation, including respect for client autonomy

Program Information

Objectives

Appraise common ethical issues that adult clients present with in everyday practice.
Evaluate how moral foundations theory can apply to clinical work.
Analyze “self of the therapist” issues that come up when dealing with clients’ ethical dilemmas.
Utilize core skills for consulting with clients about ethical dilemmas.
Demonstrate how to respect client autonomy while sometimes challenges them about potential harm to third parties.

Outline

Clinical case study
Defining the ethical domain in clients’ lives
How therapists often deal with ethical concerns of clients and why
The psychology of moral emotions
Skills in ethical consultation
Question and answer

Target Audience

Psychologists
Physicians
Addiction Counselors
Counselors
Social Workers
Marriage & Family Therapists
Art Therapists
Nurses
Other Behavioral Health Professionals

Copyright : 03/13/2022

The Ethics of Digital Practice: An Essential Guide to Providing Quality Care, Navigating Ethical Issues and Managing Legal Risk

Join Terry Casey, Ph.D, clinical psychologist and ethics expert, for this training and take away a practical and easy-to-use method for navigating ethical and legal technology issues. He will cover some of these key concerns you may have with your clinical practice in a digital world:

Distance Therapy/Teletherapy
Social Media
Email
Texting
Practicing across state lines
HIPAA compliance in use of technology
Practice websites
Cloud-based practice management systems
On-line therapist listing services
Consideration for cultural differences and diversity with treatment planning

You will leave the training equipped with a practical decision-making method you can begin using immediately for some of these difficult ethical and legal decisions, as well as key information and up-to-date resources.

Purchase today and spend just one day enhancing your knowledge of the ethical and legal issues affecting your practice and developing a deeper understanding of the utilization of technology in clinical practice.

Program Information

Objectives

Identify the five main perspectives of an ethical decision-making model to help you in clinical practice.
Analyze current clinical practices related to the use of technology, including distance therapy, social media, practice management systems, email and texting.
Determine applicable ethics codes, laws and license regulations pertaining to technology in clinical practice.
Evaluate the potential ethical courses of action to take in situations involving technology, using the Multiple Perspectives Model.
Analyze tools for a compliant practice including secure, HIPAA compliant Internet access, business associate agreements and telehealth law applications.
Develop clinical practice policies and procedures for a digital practice.
Evaluate how cultural differences might impact the clinical procedures and treatment plan for individual clients.

Outline

Navigating Ethics:

A Multiple Perspective Model
Ethical perspective
Legal perspective
Clinical-therapeutic perspective
Institutional policies perspective
Therapists’ issues perspective
Cultural & diversity considerations

Navigating Technology Issues:

Providing Quality Care and Managing Legal Risk in a Digital Age
Websites & provider listing services
Cloud-based practice management systems
Distance therapy
Social media
Email & texting
HIPAA Requirements
Competence
Informed consent
Institutional / Private practice policy
Insurance related issues

A Multiple Perspective Model:

A Clinicians Step-by-Step Guide
Evaluate problem from the five key perspectives
Got ethics? Principles & standards
Consultation essentials
Decision making and documentation

Avoiding Ethical and Legal Problems:

Strategies & Tips for Increased Competence to Avoid Risk
Secure Internet access
Importance of a Business Associate Agreement (BAA)
Telehealth laws apps
Certifications available for distance therapy
Communication and social media policy
Practicing over state lines
And several more strategies to address common problems!

Application via Relevant Case Examples

“Dr. Jones’ Website”
“The Voicemail Message”
“Distance Therapy Dilemma”
“Ashley’s Tweets”
“Facebook Friends”
“Texting Issues”

Target Audience

Counselors
Social Workers
Psychologists
Case Managers
Addiction Counselors
Therapists
Marriage & Family Therapists
Nurses
Other Mental Health Professionals