This week’s post continues with tips on how to collaborate with other health care professionals.
Don’t give too little or too much information. I have collaborated with therapists who spent an hour (!) on the phone with me, giving me every detail of their “process,” including their own feelings and reactions to various things the client has said. This is far too much information. Restrict it to what you think the other therapist should know. But be sure to give them enough. I’ve also worked with therapists who have just said, “yes, they are having marital issues, she feels he is too controlling.” This I already know. What might be more useful are aspects of her personality or background that might make her more sensitive to controlling behavior, for example.
Then, keep the contact going. As long as you are both seeing a mutual client, you should update each other on any issues or progress. Collaboration is not a one-time deal, it is an ongoing conversation.
So, to make this more concrete, if you are the individual counselor collaborating with a couples counselor then you would want to communicate any information obtained during the individual sessions that might be useful in couples counseling. Put yourself in the position of the couples counselor. What are you hearing or experiencing during your individual sessions that you would want to know as a couples counselor? And if you are the couples counselor, what kind of information do you think the individual counselor would need to know?
It’s important to note that this isn’t about being lazy and taking shortcuts, or asking another counselor to do your job for you, as I was accused of once by a pastoral counselor. (Licensed professionals are held to a higher standard than pastoral counselors who aren’t regulated by the state. They don’t have to follow the ACA Code of Ethics, either.) This is about improving efficiency and improving care for the client.
Efficiency? Why should the client tell the same story twice? This costs the client extra time, money and emotional energy. I have worked with many clients who were reluctant to see another counselor because they didn’t want to “have to go through all of this again.”
Improving care? Proper collaboration will ensure that complimentary interventions and theories are used. This is important or the client will become confused if two different therapists are addressing the same issue two different ways. Therefore, during your collaboration, be sure to discuss the boundaries of each therapist in a specific way.
For example, “I as the individual therapist will help him set better boundaries with his mother, is this agreeable to you?”
NOT
“Oh…the client will decide which one of us he wants to address his boundary issue with.”
Yours in the Joy of Knowledge,
Dr. Barbara LoFrisco
