Welcome to the Nexus of Ethics, Psychology, Morality, Philosophy and Health Care

Welcome to the nexus of ethics, psychology, morality, technology, health care, and philosophy
Showing posts with label Practice Issues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Practice Issues. Show all posts

Monday, July 14, 2014

Episode 11: Why Marketing is our Ethical Duty (and why Public Education is an ideal way to do it)

In this episode, John talks with Pauline Wallin, PhD, expert in marketing, public education, and media as well as a cofounder of The Practice Institute, where she helps clinicians build their practices.  It is important for psychologists to understand why marketing a psychological practice helps protect the public and raise awareness of how psychotherapy can improve people's lives.  Pauline makes the distinction between marketing and selling.  We also discuss four ethical ways to market psychological services via public education.

The end of this podcast, the listener will be able to:

1. Describe two ways that marketing your practice benefits the public.
2. List four ways to use public education to market your practice.
3. Describe two potential ethical pitfalls in marketing via public education, and how to avoid them.

Find this podcast on iTunes

For 1 APA-approved credit, click here.

Listen directly on this site here.



Resources

Dr. Pauline Wallin's website  @DoctorWallin

The Practice Institute  @PracticeHelp

APA Code of Conduct: Standard 5 - Advertising and Other Public Statements

National Institute of Health Information on Mental Health

American Psychological Association Media Referral Service

"Psychology Works" Facts Sheets - Canadian Psychological Association

Help a Reporter Out

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Social networking ethics: Developing best practices for the new small world.

Lannin, Daniel G.; Scott, Norman A.
Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, Vol 44(3), Jun 2013, 135-141.
doi: 10.1037/a0031794

Emerging trends online, and especially in social network sites, may be creating an environment for psychologists where transparency is increasingly unavoidable. Thus, most psychological practitioners may now have to engage in small world ethics—ethical acuity that requires an application of ethical principles to the increasingly interconnected and transparent world that is burgeoning from online culture. Fortunately, rural psychology has already provided a helpful roadmap for how to demonstrate flexibility and prudence when applying ethical principles in cultures with great transparency. Therefore, professional psychologists and psychologists in training may need to draw upon this wisdom when conceptualizing best online practices for the field that relate to social networking and personal online activity. To remain relevant, psychotherapy must adapt to the new digital culture but maintain its identity as a profession guided by its historical values and ethical principles.

The article can be found here.

Click here for one example of a social media policy via Dr. Keely Kolmes, psychologist and social media guru.

Thanks to Dr. Patricia Fox for this information.

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Texas Abortion Law Can Go Into Effect Immediately

Associated Press

AUSTIN, Texas—A federal appeals court cleared the way Friday for the immediate enforcement of a new abortion law in Texas requiring doctors to conduct a sonogram before the procedure.

The three-judge panel on Tuesday lifted a temporary stay issued by a district court judge who found the new law potentially unconstitutional, but didn't issued a legal mandate. On Friday, the judges agreed to a request by Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott to cut short the typical three-week waiting period between a ruling and its implementation.

The new law requires doctors to conduct a sonogram before performing an abortion, to show the woman the image, to play the fetal heartbeat aloud and describe the features of the fetus at least 24 hours before the abortion. There are exceptions in the case of rape, incest, fetal deformities and for women who have to travel great distances to reach a doctor.

The most recent order doesn't give time for doctors fighting the law to appeal the decision, which under normal circumstances woudn't have gone into effect until Jan. 31. The Center for Reproductive Rights, which supports the doctors, didn't have an immediate reaction to Friday's order.

The entire story is here.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Would You Like to See a Christian Psychologist?

By Sam Knapp, Ed.D., ABPP
Director of Professional Affairs

Some patients will request a psychologist of a particular gender, and psychologists will usually try to accommodate those concerns. For example, a female patient with sensitive sexual or gender-related issues might not feel comfortable raising them with a male psychologist, and an effort will be made to find a woman psychologist. However, is it possible to implicitly accept or endorse discriminatory practices by agreeing to other similar requests? For example, should psychologists respect the preferences of prospective patients who want to have Christian psychologists?

Some conservative Christians fear that psychologists will mock their religious beliefs or try to blame their problems on their religion. Consequently, having a Christian psychologist may be very important for them. Most non-Christian psychologists I have spoken to have received phone calls from prospective patients who ask them if they are Christian. One psychologist commonly responds, “no, but I am very respectful of Christian beliefs and will help you formulate goals consistent with your beliefs.” So far, no prospective Christian patient has ever failed to make an appointment after that conversation.

How should a psychologist respond if asked to provide a referral for a Christian psychologist? Perhaps one response would be to anticipate the concern of the patients, which is to have someone who respects their beliefs, without necessarily restricting the referrals to a psychologist who happens to be a Christian. It could be possible to respond by saying, “Psychologists are expected to respect the religious beliefs of their patients. I don’t have a list of Christian psychologists, but here are psychologists whom I know to be respectful of Christian beliefs.”

Should race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation be a factor in making a referral? On the one hand, it seems reasonable that some patients may want assurance that the psychologist they have will understand their racial or cultural background or respect their sexual orientation. It is possible to imagine a prospective patient who has not had a history of positive experiences with European Americans, or who has had a background with issues or struggles that even a sensitive European American would have difficulty understanding. Or, consider the case of a European American family who adopted an African American child who generally did well in school and at home. However, as a teenager he struggled to consolidate his racial identity and asked to speak to an African American psychologist.  It appears that race would be a relevant factor in making that referral.

On the other hand, psychologists who defer to patient preferences for race may inadvertently reinforce racist attitudes. So, the perception of the clinical relevance of the request appears important. Psychologists can decide how to respond to these requests by looking to three overarching ethical principles. First, we generally want to respect patient autonomy, including respecting their preferences in a health care professional. Second, we typically want to give patients a referral based on beneficence and nonmaleficence; that is, we want to provide a referral based on who we think can help the prospective patient. Finally, we are also guided by the overarching ethical principle of justice wherein we refuse to engage in unfair discrimination based on race, religion, gender, national origin, or other factors. Often justice is sufficiently important to trump other ethical principles.

I once had a patient who wanted a referral to a different psychiatrist because he said the one I had sent him to was not a “real American” (the psychiatrist was an American citizen of Filipino descent and highly competent). I refused to give him a new referral, and he stayed with the Filipino American psychiatrist, who was of benefit to him. In this case, the overarching ethical principle of justice trumped the other ethical principles. However, I might have responded differently if this patient were highly suicidal or homicidal. Then I would have made inquiries about his concerns, but ultimately deferred to his wish if doing so substantially reduced the risk of death.

Please feel free to contact me with your thoughts on this issue.