|
Apr 03, 2011, 05:53 PM
|
|
|
Hello, Jared. Please take a look at the following:
Quote:
Privilege
Psychological practice uses the word privilege to describe the legal right of keeping your clinical records confidential. (In California, this right is established in CA Evidence Code § 1014.) Because this right, in the strict legal sense, is thought of as a “thing,” psychological practice talks about “holding” the privilege. So who holds it?
Well, as I said earlier, you, the client, do. You hold the privilege of knowing and telling about your life, and you hold the privilege of determining what happens to your clinical records.
But your psychotherapist also knows about your life. Quite a bit in fact. Not just what’s in your chart, but everything you say and everything in between, including the simple fact of your being a client. Therefore, according to the principle of confidentiality, your psychotherapist is required to hold the privilege for you—even after therapy has terminated. This means that nothing he or she knows about you can be told to anyone else without your permission. Period. Not even the fact that you’re a client. That’s why you have to sign a Release of Information (ROI) form to have your psychotherapist give any information about your case to any other person, such as a physician.
In my practice, if I receive an ROI requesting information to be sent to a third party, I require my client’s original signature on the form—not a fax and not a copy—and even then I will check with my client to make sure the client really wants the information to be released.
Criminal Activity. “What if I have committed a crime?” some individuals ask. Well, even criminal activity is protected by psychotherapeutic confidentiality. So you can relax, if that happens to be your particular concern—unless, of course, you are still engaged in criminal activity which jeopardizes the life or safety of others, and you reveal the details of this activity in psychotherapy. Such a case could fall under one of the exceptions to confidentiality (see below).
Suicide. “What if I talk about suicide? Not that I plan to kill myself, but sometimes I think about suicide. If I tell you about these thoughts, will you put me in hospital?” is a common concern. Actually, the issue here is whether there is a reasonable suspicion that you are likely to kill yourself. So just thinking about suicide doesn’t necessarily warrant any extreme action on the part of the psychotherapist. A good psychotherapist should know how to spot the difference between fantasy and real danger and should know how to work clinically with all your fantasies, however dark and fearful.
Insurance. If you read the fine print, you’ll notice that when (or if) you sign an insurance form you are authorizing your psychotherapist to give any information to anyone in the insurance company—and this means anyone, even a secretary, not necessarily another mental health professional—who demands it. If your psychotherapist refuses to release the information, he or she does not get paid. And where does all this intimate information about you go when they get it? Anywhere they want.
Exceptions to Confidentiality
In California law, there are several exceptions to the confidentiality of psychotherapy (see the details of these laws, below).
Three of these exceptions to confidentiality concern harm to self or others:
• Where there is a reasonable suspicion of child abuse or elder adult physical abuse;
• Where there is a reasonable suspicion that you may present a danger of violence to others;
• Where there is a reasonable suspicion that you are likely to harm yourself unless protective measures are taken.
In all of the above cases, the psychotherapist is either allowed or required by law to break confidentiality in order to protect you, or someone you might endanger, from harm.
|
http://www.guidetopsychology.com/confid.htm
Since you are a denizen of the Netherlands, California law may well differ in regard to what a Netherlands' therapist can, may or must disclose in a pyschotherapist-patient relationship with a minor when there is potential for self-harm.
My hope is with hard work you are better able to deal with this illness that plagues you.
|