Ethical Standards of Mental Health Essay

The limit of all therapy sessions, whether verbal discipline or write records, should be considered confidential. Therefore, this data should not be passed on to a leash party without the written consent of a knob nor is legal guardian. However some exceptions be do for certain situations. The state law domiciliates that psychological wellness jobs should describe the following situations to the needful someone or agencies. Duty to warn the cheer A invitee whitethorn introduce his intentions to wrong an otherwise person to a mental health profession.In this case the mental health professional mustinessiness warn the supposed victim and musical composition the figure to the government activity. If a node discloses his intentions to commit suicide, mental health professions should set forth the authorities and the family members of the knob. (2. b. ). Abuse of children and vulnerable adults wellness c atomic number 18 professions argon required to adver tise the legal authorities and the social service agencies, if a lymph gland discloses that he has been abusing a child or vulnerable adult or intents to demoralise them. Prenatal flick to controlled substances.Read more(prenominal)Essay About intellectual Well-beingHealth c are serve should report cases of admitted prenatal exposure to abusive and controlled substances that are potential droply abuseful. In the events of clients death When the client is declared dead, their spouses or parents carry the obligation to access their records. Minorsguardianship The guardians or parents of a non turn minor client pass the right to access the clients records. Profession misconduct Health care professionals are required to report, cases of profession misconduct by the other health care professionals.During meetings of professional disciplinary, records of the profession actions should be released so as to substantiate disciplinary concerns. Insurance providers sometimes insura nce companies whitethorn require information concerning the clients services especially, treatments plans, types of services offered and the case notes. (2. b. ). Ethics and Laws Related to Mental Health evince keeping Mental health professionals are required to keep records in a secure place and to protect the clients confidentiality. distress of the health care professionals could resent to malpractices cl designates because it breaches the standard of the care that is expected of a mental health professionals laws and ethics that governing record keeping may include when a uncomplaining is admitted in the hospital, on that point complete medical checkup record should be do available at all times. These documents should confer the patients continuum of case. medical checkup records should include entries that are made by person health care professions. These entries must be made instantly after the event as taken place to avoid disputes.The entries made by the health car e profession must be decipherable and consist of the authors and signature and the patient details. E very record made must state the doctor who was responsible for making decisions of the time of the care event. Health care professionals create control, store and dispose of records concerning their professional move so as to facilitate the provision of services meet institutional requirements and check off accuracy of billing and payments. Social workers must take reasonable moves to take in that the entries in medical records are accurate and reflect on the resistant of services provided. 2. c. ).The confidentiality of children Children are deemed to consent to their own treatment if they arte capable. The law states that a capable child is one who dates the need for medical treatment, what the treatment entails the benefits and risks of the treatment. Doctors quite a little treat children without the permission of parents or guardians. If they explain all the details and make up ones mind that the child understands them. There is no particular age at which a child is deemed capable. Doctors should use their purposes to make the decision.The medical treatment for children can be kept confidential from their parents if t concerns birth control, hinge uponually transmitted diseases and mental health problems. (2. d. ). multicultural competence Multicultural competence has been expressed as the appreciation of unalike refinements in regard to education and psychology multicultural competence is the awareness, knowledge, and skills that enable pot to interact respectfully with people from incompatible backgrounds and values. Multicultural competence ensures that people have the ability to work in effect and honourablely with people from antithetic cultures.Multicultural knowledge is evident when an soulfulness has a clear arrest of other cultures that are different from their own. Individuals who are multiculturally competent should have an ad vised understanding of the history, practices, traditions and values of other cultures. Multicultural awareness requires that one be fully aware of how the attitudes, values and beliefs of people interact with others who are culturally different from them. Culturally competent individuals should be able to interact successfully and strongly with people who have different beliefs, values and traditions to them.Multicultural skills refer to skills that are used by individual to interact successfully and effectively with people who have a different cultural background from their own. Multicultural competences arise from an individual motivation to vex skills and believe in certain manner, mainly derived from our personal characteristics and from institutions and organizational backgrounds in which we develop. Multicultural competence is therefore seen as a contribution of twain organizations and individuals efforts.How to promote estimable treatment of diverse populations immediat ely our society has evolved into a culturally diverse society and thus multicultural education and nurture is very crucial. Our cooking systems should address the problems of the world as a whole to allow students have a break down understanding of actions taken by a certain state should be viewed in terms of how they implicate on other states as well. The monocultural nature of training should be abolished from the training of professional counsellingors.They should be educated on some(prenominal) multicultural and cross-cultural issues. This way, they will be able to recognize that race, ethnicity and culture are functions of each individual. Usually, the traditional counseling techniques used were only employ to the minority groups. advise professionals should be trained to recognize that the client and the healer are highly linked to historical and current experiences of oppression and racism. As a result, the counselor, client and the counseling process are more apt(pr edicate) to be influenced by racial relations in the larger society.Counseling professionals should therefore be trained to offer touch opportunities to services and equal judgments. Ethical provisions require that professionals who have no adequate training in working with clients from different cultural backgrounds should not be allowed to work with clients. This is because they are unethical and could be potentially harmful to clients due to ridiculous thinking and judgments. Quite heart-to-heartly, the white culture is seen as a controlling culture and thus counselors who are biased by this are in all probability to cause disallow effects on the clients.Therefore counseling professionals must become culturally aware, so as to have a better understanding of their own conditions, those of their clients and their socio-political system in which they both belong. Counseling professionals should understand the world view of each culturally different client. Counselors should be ingenious in the sense that they must familiarize themselves wit h he relevant research and latest findings regarding mental dis influences of different ethnic and racial groups. They should become more involved with minority groups outside the counseling settings as to broaden their perspectives of the minorities.Clinicians duty to warn Medical health professionals have a legal and ethical duty of keeping confidential their communications with their patients. A clinicians duty to warn and protect states that if a client discloses his intentions to harm another person to a medical health professional, the professional has the right tot inform the supposed victim and report the plan to the necessary authorities. Confidentiality is a primary right of the client accorded to him during his therapy sessions. (2. c. ). However in some circumstance, confidentiality may be broken for ethical and legal reasons.Various apostrophize decisions have been enacted to grant the healer permissio n to warn and protect individuals who may be affected by a clients redoubted actions. If a mental health professional fail to predict that a client is insecurityous and fails to warn the supposed victim, he thus exposes himself open to lawsuits. (Harman, 2006). A medical health professional has the responsibility of warning, protecting and predicting, when a client communicate serious threats of harming a reasonably identifiable Medical health professionals working with dangerous clients are often faced with legal, ethical and moral dilemmas.They must carefully access the risks involved to the potential victim, the client and themselves for breaching the confidentiality. Health professionals should inform the clients of the limits of confidentiality, record the steps taken in straddle to protect those under potential danger and keep record of notes of the clients threats. Confidentiality can be breached in cases where a client poses danger to others, when a client discloses plans to cause harm to someone or to keep on a dangerous client from causing harm to others.When a patient who is human immunodeficiency virus positive discloses to his therapist plans of having un protected sex with an identifiable other who is not HIV positive, without their consent, the medical professional has the right to inform the potential victim and the necessary social service agencies. In this case, the confidentiality of the patents communication with the therapist is breached so as to protect the potential victim. The speak to provides that if a health professional identifies a clients plan to intentionally harm other people, they should warn the potential victim and report to the necessary authorities or risk facing lawsuits. (2. . ).However, this conflict with ethical requirement that, any patient has the right to strict confidentiality and that there should be no overlap of information outside of the therapist-client relationship so as to have effective therapy. (Simo n, 2001). A number of complicated and legal issues arise when a HIV positive person intentionally refuses to tell their partner about the first step of infecting them. The character of the therapist mainly determines the therapists ability to disclose the information to the potential victim. HIV is an incurable disease that causes danger and potential discrimination the victim.When there is existence of a real danger to a potential victim, confidentiality is not considered as an absolute value. Before disclosing this kind of information to a third party the therapist should consult with the client and inform him of the limits of confidentiality. He must be made aware of the fact that there are certain limits to the rule of confidentiality. The client must be informed that in such a case, where a client discloses the intentions of harming a third party, thee medical health professional has the obligation of informing potential victim and the necessary authorities.In most states, the confidentiality of patients information is protected by statute except in certain circumstances which are, physicians should report information about a patient without his consent in order to protect the society. (Shaner, 2000). Dual relationships A 40 year old therapist becomes attracted to a 38 year old client and soon realizes that the spirits are mutual. They discuss the situation and mutually agree to terminate therapy and begin dating. They last get married.Dual relationships exist when therapists assume two or more different roles at one particular time dual relationships may include socializing with a client or go emotionally or sexually involved with a client. This kind of behaviour is seen as unethical in the counseling profession. Such relationships impair the judgment and decisions made by the therapist and result in conflicts of interest and exploitation of the client. (2. e. ). intimate misconduct is considered as the biggest ethical violation of a therapist and as a result has become a common and serious allegation in malpractice suits.According to the laws and ethics of medical professionals, sexual intimacy with clients is prohibited. These laws provide that counselors should not have any form of sexual relationships with clients and should not counsel people with whom they have had a sexual relationship with. Medical health professionals and other social workers must not get involved in sexual intimacies with clients, whether the activity is mutual or forced. The CCA standards provide that psychologists must not engage themselves in sexual activities with current therapy clients.According to these ethics and laws, the therapist has violated the ethics by becoming sexually involved with a current client. By get involved with a client and becoming sexually active the therapist violated laws which stated that a psychologist must not get engaged in sexual activities with clients. Sexual relationships amidst a therapist and a client can hav e very many negative impacts especially on the client. The experience could cause negative effects on the personality of the client arising from mistrust of opposite sex relationships.The client may become emotionally disturbed and experience feeling of depression. Due to this, the client may have difficulty in pursue therapy. (2. e. ) By deciding to quit therapy and get married, the therapist made an ethical decision. According to the Canadian professional code of ethics, psychologists must avoid getting involved in sexual activities s with the clients. This is because it interferes with therapists judgment and the clients ability to purse treatment. Therefore, quitting therapy so that they both have respect for the professional code of ethics.Medical health professionals must aim at promoting and maintaining cordial interprofessional relationships. However, despite the fact that the feelings between the therapist and client were mutual, and the fact that they both quit therapy to get married, their actions were unethical because they breached the professionals code of ethics. Therapists are bestowed with the responsibility of setting up appropriate sexual boundaries for their clients, communicating the boundaries and aiming at attaining a professional relationship rather than a personal relationship.The CCA provides that prosecute in sexual activities before a period of two historic period after therapy has been terminated, is a violation of professional code of ethics. Therefore quitting therapy so as to get married was unethical on the therapist and the clients side. Courts have therefore ruled claims of consent by client engaging in sexual relationships with therapists, due to the vulnerability of clients and also the mighty affects of the opposite sex relationships. (Videbeck, 2007).