When great clinicians have great information to share they want to share it LOUD, and help as many people as they can.  With the internet, we can easily share our helpful and powerful information to anyone who needs it.  Due to only being able to practice healthcare within the state’s in which a clinician is licensed, some may be tempted to label their services as psychoeducation rather than psychotherapy.  Most clinicians may not even be trying to “get away” with practicing across state lines (interstate counseling) without being licensed in all states, but truly be wanting to solely provide psychoeducation.

As many clinicians who have provided psychoeducational sessions know, it is difficult to keep the lines clear.  Often in psychoeducational settings, therapeutic material is brought up and difficult to avoid or refer out.  Also, it may not be reasonable to expect that a participant in a psychoeducational group will think of their instructor as their only teacher rather than their teacher/therapist.  Especially when their teacher’s name is Joe Smith, LCSW, LMHC, LPC, PsyD, MFT…

So what is the solution? 

My first solution is to provide psychoeducation in a way that does not lead to any confusion about what is being provided. Let me draw an analogy from my experience today on jury duty. We were told that the defendant is to be assumed innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt.  Huh… What…That can be confusing. Even the defending attorney misspoke when explaining it and was corrected by the judge.  So, here is my analogy: ask yourself if you have any reasonable doubt that the client will clearly understand that you are not providing psychotherapy in any form to them. This means making it very CLEAR that you are an instructor, teaching a course to students, using a syllabus and lessons, and you are not providing healthcare. You can have a separate website and platform for connecting with students. You can also have the process and marketing of your course reviewed by peers. 

The second solution is for the participants to be clients in a therapeutic group and only practice within the states in which you are licensed.  But you might ask, “What if the client does not need or want counseling and only psychoeducation?” If someone wants psychoeducation, they likely have a therapeutic reason for it.  Also, they do not have to need therapy but simply want it. Often the stigma of psychotherapy gets in the way of people receiving help. Hopefully, we can help reduce this stigma in society.

One clinician asked me if they ought to use a HIPAA secure platform for conduction psychoeducational sessions. Since HIPAA secure platforms are about protecting confidentiality I would recommend that. Many of the skills that we learn when studying telemental health services have to do with providing safety, reducing risk, and providing the best service to our clients. Therefore, even if a clinician is only providing psychoeducation to someone and not healthcare, I believe implementing many of the standards of telemental health services is still best practice.

Please share your wisdom, thoughts, and experience.