Making therapy safe and effective for you
The basis of any helping relationship is trust. Therefore it is important for you to know you are can trust me as your therapist to always have your interests as paramount. I am a member of the The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) I abide by their ethical framework for good counselling practice. As a member of the Voluntary Register and Senior Accredited Practitioner I abide by their Code of Practice and am subject to their complaints procedure, which can be found on the BACPwebsite. My registration no. is 503532.
Confidentiality is an integral part of a trusting relationship. This means what is shared will not be disclosed to a third party. All of this would be discussed with you at the assessment session. The limitation to this is if you told me anything whereby you were a risk to yourself in any way or a risk to another adult or child. I ask for GP contact details and any history of psychiatric illness or admissions. I may write a letter of introduction to your GP if they were currently treating you. I would make contact with your GP if I felt you were unable to keep yourself safe such as at risk of suicide or serious self harm. Further limitation to confidentiality would be the intention to act or actual acts of terrorism or anything outside of the law. I would discuss this with you but would maintain the duty to inform appropriate agencies when necessary.
Making a working agreement:
When we first meet, we would discuss your problem and think about your therapeutic needs . We would find a focus and think about what needs to be explored to effect the change you were looking for. We would discuss whether my approach is right for you. Sometimes we might negotiate about 4 - 6 initial exploratory sessions before agreeing where the focus needs to be and how we would work to meet your longer term goals. Sometimes, this is ascertained very much earlier or the work you need to do is complete in a few sessions. I would discuss fees with you and how many sessions were appropriate for the type of problem you needed to bring. The working agreement would be reviewed periodically to be clear and open about whether you were getting what you wanted from the psychotherapy. A session is 60 minutes long. My fee is £55, if you cancel your appointment with me with less than 48 hours notice I will charge you the full fee unless I refill the slot. I do offer a large proportion of my sessions at concessionary rates which become available at times, so please check this out if the cost is prohibitive.
I keep a record of the psychotherapeutic work and store it in a safe locked place. Under the Data Protection Act (1998) You have the right to read any records I make. It is an essential part of my professional accreditation to undertake regular supervision and to undertake continuous professional development. When I take an issue to supervision, arising from the therapeutic work, I always change any identifying data such as any names and places.
I hope that this gives you an idea of how I work with you to keep you safe and meet your needs, whilst working within the ethical framework of my professional body.
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