Do Therapists Have to Report Abuse by Other Therapists?

I agree - there is no "have to."

There are only "shoulds."

J (my T) is contacting the NASW call line for advice for his own sake.
I do not think anything is going to be reported as I have made it abundantly clear that it's not what I want.
Even so, I'm going to go ahead and tell them both everything -- starting with J -- so that they can have their own clear consciences or whatever and so that we never have to have this debate again.

Ideally, we will move on from that with them leaving the ball in my court -- I would just like to process it all and heal. And, if I cut S out of my life completely, I want to be the one to do it. I don't want it to happen because my T reported him and he's angry at me. I want to be in control of this. Not anyone else.

J told me to be selfish in this.
To not worry about S's future clients. That my only obligation is to myself.
So, being selfish, right or wrong, I do not want to report any of this. I don't want to go through that.

It's just...if J does report it and the board asks for more information or considers it bad enough to do something about and asks for my participation...THEN I will feel hugely obligated to future clients.... it's one thing to talk about the "what ifs" ... it's something else to actually have to put my foot down and say "No, I will not give you information."

I am hoping they do not put me in that position.

I certainly could not and would not allow other adults to make that kind of decision on my behalf if the laws of our land do not consider me fully mentally incapicitated. My parents did that when I was their responsibility and it lead me to not feel I had control over my destiny, so as an adult I allowed my parents and others to make decisions for me that I was against or was unsure of. I would feel like those therapist are treating me like a child and at great emotional expense. You are not respond for your therapist to get a clean conscious. Besides, how can they have a clean conscious without your consent and cooperation.

You have no responsibility when it comes to your mental health to look out for what may or may not happen to others. You have to do what is best for you for your emotional and physical well being. And, if you want to report your ex therapist then go for it. You deserve to have that control.

My position exactly. I would be furious if any subsequent therapist reported my ex-therapist without my permission and also if they were pushing me to report. I would feel utterly disempowered. I also get pissed off when people imply that anyone has moral obligation to take care of other clients of the unethical therapist. In most cases, reporting because you want to "protect his/her other clients" is a lie. People report because they seek justice for themselves, not because they want to protect others, so whoever makes that false claim, please, spare me..I wasn't born yesterday. If we were talking about children who were in danger of getting harmed, I would feel differently, because children are often unable to leave harmful situations on their own without an outside intervention. But when adults are concerned, while I understand all psychological reasons that make it difficult to leave unethical therapists, objectively people always have that choice. Their psychological struggles around leaving are theirs to resolve. No one can do that for them nor should they attempt to. These are highly personal struggles that hold a lot of potential for self-empowerment for the person, but he or she should make that choice alone.

It sounds like you didn't refer to S much (or at all) by name when speaking about him. So there could be some element of doubt in J about whether the person on the forms is the person that he wishes to report? People after all can have multiple past therapists. It is unlikely anyone will make a report unless they are 100% certain who the person is.

So one way out of a mandated reporting would be to refuse to confirm the name of the person on the forms is the person you have been speaking about (S).

Anyway: don't let them pressure you into this in any way. If your gut instinct is that this will damage you, you are probably correct in this. This is a difficult situation, take care.

Deleted because I ended up calling my T and asking, and she wasn't thinking of saying anything to him or reporting, so no need to leave this question here! Back to the thread...

I don't believe he can report that without your permission because of confidentiality.

I agree – be selfish. Your emotional well-being is what is most important so being selfish is far from wrong.


My t told me that if she had reported my ex-t without my permission, she would have had to list me, the client, as “anonymous.” Confidentiality rules will protect you if your t does submit a report. So, the board will not be able to contact you unless you give your t permission to list you as the client.

When I hear therapist talking against other therapist and what the other therapist is giving a client that they are unwilling to give a client, especially if they share the same client, I don't think of professional ethics first. I think of the therapist feeling inadequate. "The clients emails are too many and too long, they've called me in the middle of the night or on my vacation. If they're getting this from another therapist they'll expect me to do it too. Don't they know etiquette? I only offered because I feel inadequate."

I would also have to ask myself why I would need to bate her with or others certain statements. Is this a part of my pattern? And, maybe I should talk to my therapist about it? For me this would be the triangle of mom and dad issues.

How someone else practices therapy by allowing phone calls of 2 hours or 100 emails a month is not a justifiable reason to even consider reporting someone.

[QUOTE=AllHeart;5744446]I agree – be selfish. Your emotional well-being is what is most important so being selfish is far from wrong.


My t told me that if she had reported my ex-t without my permission, she would have had to list me, the client, as “anonymous.” Confidentiality rules will protect you if your t does submit a report. So, the board will not be able to contact you unless you give your t permission to list you as the client.[/QUOTE

In this case, if the therapist lists the client as "anonymous" in her report, the board will throw it out. They won't bother to investigate because there will be no person with first hand experience of abuse to confirm the facts. Everything in the therapist's report would be just hearsay impossible to confirm. In fact, the California board says it clearly. They say that anyone can report unethical therapists, however, the reports from the third parties have a low chance of being investigated and anonymous reports don't get investigated for obvious reasons that nothing in them could be confirmed because the therapist who was reported would obviously deny everything.

[quote=Ididitmyway;5744471] That may be true in CA. It is NOT true in my state. A report filed directly from the client, or named client, certainly would carry more weight in my state, but, a licensed, professional therapist filing a complaint in my state is not dismissed so quickly, thankfully. I'm sure it would be dismissed if a friend or family member submitted the report listing the client as anonymous though.

My ex husband was on a review panel for behavioral health complaints in his state for ~6 years. He left resigned ~2 years ago. He also says that anonymous complaints NEVER get investigated. If the situation is so outrageous and someone is in harms way, mandatory reporting laws are meant to deal with the issue. But, when it comes to clients, other therapist or friends, neighbors and family of the client reporting anonymously it get regulated to the back file, then to be moved onto the trash. He has always stated that there is not enough resources to do justice to the cases that they already have all the names and cooperation of the alleged injured party(s).

[QUOTE=AllHeart;5744474]I just don't see how it could not be dismissed if nothing can be verified. All the board can do in cases when the harmed party is not named is to contact the therapist and to question him about the information they received. The therapist would obviously deny everything ant that would be the end of it. Why would any board bother even start? As AB said, they don't have enough resources to properly investigate even the complaints from clients with convincing evidence because they get tons of them every year. Who would bother to look at anonymous reports whether from professionals or not?

What does exactly your state licensing board do when they get reports from professionals who don't name the clients they have received information from? How exactly do they investigate it if there is no one to question?

I referred to S by his first name a lot. I'm not sure if he has his last name.
I really hope it doesn't come down to me having to refuse information to anyone. That's not how I want this to resolve.... J is my therapist, and I like to think he's on my side... same with Group T

You won't have to be in the position to refuse information because your current therapist is not allowed by law to report your ex-therapist without your explicit written authorization. If he does it'd be a breach of confidentiality. Simple as that.

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at... are you implying I'm bating someone with something?

I don't have any contact with my current therapist or group therapist between sessions.... that's not something I'm looking to have... confused.

I don’t profess to know exactly how my state board does these things or why. My guess would be that depending on what is being reported exactly, the therapist’s testimony is given enough merit for further inquiry of some sort. Calling the reported therapists colleagues if they have any might be a reasonable start. In my case, my ex-t confessed to her colleague that she entered an inappropriate dual relationship with me. My ex-t is now being counseled for this. So if the board were to call any one of my ex-t’s colleague’s, there is validation (at least for part of my story). Also, my t has been witness to the trauma my ex-t caused me. I’ve shown her drunk text messages and emails from my ex-t. Maybe a colleague knows of my ex-t’s alcohol problems. I have shared with my t detailed, very strange, personal information about ex-t that might lend credibility. And maybe there are more complaints out there that would also support the report. Who knows?? Apparently my state recognizes not every situation is a black and white 2-piece puzzle??

I hope you aren't put in the awkward position of your t requesting your ex-t's last name. J sounds like he is for sure on your side. He was the one who told you to be selfish, right? As for having to refuse info to anyone else, confidentiality will prohibit you from having to do so. I don't think you have anything to worry about.

That's what I thought. You don't know how your state handles these cases but you said as if you knew for a fact that reports from professionals about their colleagues behaviors are "NOT" dismissed. In reality you don't really know that.

[QUOTE=AllHeart;5744663 Apparently my state recognizes not every situation is a black and white 2-piece puzzle?? [/QUOTE]

What makes it apparent? Do you know of any specific cases when your state board recognized some situation as not a black and white 2-piece puzzle?

Again, you are making unsubstantiated claims and by saying "apparently" you are asserting that your claims are facts even though you don't have evidence to back them up.

The reason I am harping on this and on all issues that have to do with professional laws and ethics is not because I want to be argumentative but because I see a great deal of confusion about these issues on this board. People confuse facts with their beliefs and their wishes. Just because you or somebody else believe that things should work in the certain way doesn't mean they do. if you don't have first hand knowledge/experience in the area of psychotherapy laws and ethics it'd be wise and responsible just to say that you don't know instead of presenting unverified information as facts because you'd like it to be that way.

I don't mean to lecture you but I do hate when people get misinformed, misled and when they misinform and mislead others because they speculate instead of doing research and fact-checking and because it's difficult for them to say "I don't know". There is a great deal of misinformation being circulated on this forum and it harms people instead of helping them. Let's all be responsible as to what we claim here.

Apart from that, I'd suggest anyone who hangs out here not to rely on any information posted on any forum. Please, do your own research, contact the agencies that deal with professional legal and ethical issues, contact attorneys and professional organizations. Don't just assume that things work in the certain way because you believe so or because you want them to.

Laws and rules are rarely black and white. They are not applied consistently nor are they interpreted consistently. Not by governing bodies nor by courts.
Everyone here is entitled to their opinion and giving it is not saying it is in stone. No one should take anyone's opinion as gospel without checking it out, in my opinion. In my profession -it keeps me employed when people don't..

Ididitmyway - The only claim I thought I was making was that my state does not dismiss anonymous client reports submitted by professionals. Consider the fact that I have done my research to know this. Because I don't know the hows or whys doesn't make it untrue. "Thank you" for the lecturing advice. I hope you can follow it as you preach it.

Oh, I always follow it. I wouldn't be preaching it if I didn't follow it myself. I challenge anyone to find any post of mine where I would state something as a fact that was either incorrect or not backed by some sources. Whenever I am not sure if information is factually accurate I say so or I say that I believe something to be true but not that it is true.

I didn't know you had done your research in regards to your state proceedings. I trust that you found something that supports your assumption. Also, I didn't say that because you didn't know hows and whys your claim was not true. All I said was that you didn't know how your state licensing board operates while asserting that you knew. I said it because you didn't mention that you had done your research.

I don't want to beat this to death. I made my point and I think we understood each other. Have a great day.

My post was responding to other posters and I did not state that.

I hope that you can keep control of this situation. Good luck to you.

Sure, I get that and I'm sure he is on your side. Only problem is, if (and thats a big if) his hands are tied by the law to report S then it doesn't matter whether he is on your side or not, he's got to do it regardless of your feelings about it.

So my own personal recommendation would be to try to withhold his name/confirming his name unless you are either 100% sure you want him reported, or you are 100% sure they are not going to report him.

(By the way I'm not commenting on whether other posters are right or wrong about the legalities of this. I am British, so I don't have a clue regarding that).