November 4, 2020, Catholic Charities, Harrisburg via Zoom
9:00am-3:00pm

This training will teach clinicians about the unique aspects of maintaining integrity, professional boundaries, and ethics while providing home and community-based services. It is based on the principles addressed through the Codes of Ethics for Licensed Social Workers, Licensed Professional Counselling and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists. It will explore topics related to Relationships with Clients, Conflict of Interest, Confidentiality, and Technology. The goal of the training is to help therapists better manage their roles ethically.

Home and community-based clinicians often struggle to manage multiple roles, such as therapist, case manager, advocate, and/or coach, which can lead to role confusion.  The clinician may have to quickly trade hats and determine which role they are playing and why. It can be challenging to navigate the environment and avoid boundary crossing when families are offering food, inviting you to take a dip the pool, or to become friends on Instagram. This training will provide guidance on how to address these challenges as it pertains to home and community-based services.

Confidentiality in home and community-based services requires skill to anticipate and respond appropriately to potential breaches. When entering the home, clinicians may encounter uninvited friends and neighbors wanting to participate in the session.  Clinicians must quickly determine if this will enhance the session, and what is needed to ensure that confidentiality is not broken. Telehealth services present additional challenges with having a limited view of who else might be present during the session. This training will provide clinicians with options to think quickly though these issues and prevent a breach in confidentiality.

The trainers will engage staff using case scenarios, group discussion and thought-evoking dilemmas to build critical thinking skills associated with challenging decisions that clinicians face working in our field. The trainers will tap into their experience providing and supervising Family Based Mental Health Services to enhance the focus on home and community-based service provision, as it relates to ethics and professional boundaries.

Objectives

As a result of completing this training activity, participants will be able to:

1. Define ethics in relationship to law and morality.
2. Recognize the unique challenges found in home and community-based services.
3. Distinguish between use of self and self-disclosure.
4. State the difference between boundary crossing and boundary violations.
5. Identify Five Steps to Ethical Decision Making.
6. Name three ways to prevent a breach in confidentiality.