As a senior accredited member of the British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and registered member of the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP), I believe our profession is lagging behind (all psychotherapists in England should be regulated, say experts, after claims due to abuse, October 19).
The truth is, I could have set this up in practice without having to go through the rigorous processes these two organizations require of me. The fact that I have chosen to be accountable to two separate bodies is because I know that what psychotherapists and counselors do is of great importance.
Our regulators require us to undergo ongoing training and regular supervision from an experienced practitioner to support and challenge us, and also require that we too undertake our own therapy so that we attend to our own wounds and legacies to heal them. minimize. get caught up in our customers.
In addition, both bodies have complaints procedures, with which I had direct experience early in my career. There was no legal obligation for me to do this, but I learned from the process.
I believe we need a new regulatory body, separate from the membership organizations we already have, to hold us to the highest standards and protect people from rogue practitioners. We need an organization whose only Our job is to set, monitor and enforce standards. This will raise the profile of our profession and give the public greater protection and confidence in us. So let us have legal regulations and let us not be afraid of them.
Filippa Smethurst
Duns Tew, Oxfordshire
It is relatively easy to regulate the practice of psychotherapy. Almost all designated psychotherapy courses last four to seven years and meet similar requirements. Most people who complete this demanding course of study will be accredited as a psychotherapist and can register with the UKCP or an equivalent body, so there is a well-established professional pathway.
If the title of psychotherapist were properly protected, members of the public seeking psychotherapy (as opposed to counseling) would be far less vulnerable to abuse or poor standards of care by poorly trained – or even untrained – people claiming to be psychotherapists. work.
In counseling the problem is more complicated. Counseling practice spans a wide range of organizations and specialties, and training varies accordingly in type and intensity. Anyone can currently take a course in some version of ‘counseling’ and call themselves a counselor on that basis. Even good counseling training does not necessarily emphasize the degree of personal therapy needed for more reliable and safer practice, and obtaining good regulation in such a broad area is a challenge.
Furthermore, the distinction between counseling and psychotherapy has been blurred in recent years by courses – including good ones offered by reputable academic institutions – in ‘counseling and psychotherapy’, which effectively provide training in counselling, with the implication that this entitles practitioners to also to describe themselves as psychotherapists.
Regulating counseling is more challenging than psychotherapy and must be done, but psychotherapy can be addressed more quickly with immediate corresponding benefits for a vulnerable public.
Sue Lieberman
Retired UKCP Psychotherapist, Edinburgh
Your article highlights the potential for abuse of power that can occur during counseling sessions, given the private nature of the work and the vulnerability of the client. But the main reason for this is not the lack of regulation of the individual therapists, but the lightweight training process and easy access to psychotherapy courses.
I trained as a psychotherapist at a well-known university in London and at the end of the three year training I knew every theory under the sun, but had learned nothing about the effects of talk therapy on brain function, nervous system function or the potentially harmful physiological effects of rekindling traumatic experiences.
At the end of the training, I practiced for a short time before I fully understood the shortcomings of the training and the profession. The possibility of causing more harm than good became apparent. None of my fellow students really knew what they were doing, and I honestly fear for their customers.
It is not the regulation of the practitioners that needs to be addressed, it is the regulation of the course providers, ensuring that what they offer is adequately researched and proven to be effective.
The only barrier to entry for many courses is money, not qualifications or emotional and intellectual intelligence. If you can afford to take the training, the course provider will find a way to accept you. The course providers and institutions need to be scrutinized and access standards raised.
Allison Alexander
Brighton
Since 2012, a robust system for regulating therapists has been in place. It is the Accredited Registers program administered by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA). Therapy organizations can apply to have their own registers accredited by the PSA, which involves meeting and maintaining strict governance standards, with public protection being a priority.
Each therapist on such a register is properly trained, subject to professional and ethical codes of practice and has a robust complaints procedure available to their clients. Registrants of a PSA-accredited register will display the PSA logo in their publicity.
Because this is a voluntary arrangement, this does not prevent someone from calling themselves a psychotherapist or counselor. Only legal regulation would protect the title. Many counselors and psychotherapists would like to see their designations protected, but not if it means excluding the rich variety of therapeutic approaches, many of which are non-medical and not available on the NHS, in the drive for the standardization and manualization that legal provisions make possible. regulations easier to implement.
The last Labor government in 2010 attempted to impose such a prescriptive legal regime of counseling and psychotherapy under the then Health Professions Council. It did not survive the first legal challenge from members of the profession. The current government must learn from this.
Any future legal regime must embrace and protect the diversity of therapeutic approaches that psychotherapy offers, especially those outside the medical paradigm, while ensuring optimal public protection. This can only be achieved through constructive cooperation between the government and the psychotherapeutic professions.
John Fletcher
London