Ashley Nordberg

Ashley Nordberg

Initial Post Week 1 Response

Hello Ashley,

I appreciate your insight on ethical and legal considerations for individual therapy and family and group therapy. I agree with you that ethical considerations are foundational practices used by nurses when dealing with ethical issues. When a nurse is handling a client, there are ethical issues that arise which must be dealt with while delivering the patient care. Aspects of ethical and legal consideration also need to be observed in counseling therapy.  There are ethical and legal differences between family and group therapy and individual therapy.  While individual therapy occurs between the person in the therapy and the counselor or the therapists. Group therapy occurs when a group of people is treated together in a therapeutic environment. In groups, members are cohesive and have a commonality, which helps them to address the current issues collectively (Sommers, Feldman, & Knowlton, 2008). This centers a significant difference in their consideration.

In advanced nursing practice, confidentiality lays the ground for effective treatment and therapeutic alliance that exists between the client and the therapist. According to McClanahan (2014), some constraints laws ceils therapist from disclosing information shared by clients in private session with the group. Indeed, privacy is not guaranteed in group therapy because ideas are shared among many people. Thus, one member can decide to disclose the issues discussed in the group. A therapist can use measures in the counseling sessions to guarantee clients the confidentiality of their information. In many cases, when dealing with a group of clients, there are grounds rules set to avoid instances of privacy violation (Breeskin, 2011).

The session of shifting from individual to family therapy was okay. However, the issue of confidentiality is also a key area of concern. Therapist deal with many clients, and at times,  he/she plans a private session with every member of the group. Thus therapists must not disclose private information of the client to the group.

Reference:

Breeskin, J. (2011). Procedures and guidelines for group therapy. The Group Psychologist, 21(1). Retrieved from http://www.apadivisions.org/division-49/publications/newsletter/group-psychologist/2011/04/group-procedures.aspx

Sommers, G., Feldman, S., & Knowlton, K. (Producers). (2008a). Legal and ethical issues for mental health professionals, volume 1: Confidentiality, privilege, reporting, and duty to warn [Video file]. Mill Valley, CA: Psychotherapy.net.