Confidentiality And Privilege In Psychological Care

Students and clients may have difficulty understanding the concepts of privacy, confidentiality and privilege. Although these concepts are related there have certain particularities. Privacy in psychological services involves that clients and patients are usually treated privately. In this regard the psychology professional and his team must take reasonable measures not to reveal the identity, discuss information, or disclose the contents of communications with others of his/her clients. Importantly, these measures should rest on the Principles of the APA Code of Ethics. Privacy is not a status protected by law, but it is part of the professional client-therapist relationship (Mentor Research Institute, 2007). In addition, privacy encompasses that the person taking the service has the agency to disclose how much information they want to reveal to his/her therapist and keep to itself what he/she considers is pertinent. Mental health professionals must respect the concept of privacy as an inalienable right of every individual as a human being whether or not it is their client, (Koocher & Keith-Spiegel, 2008). On the other hand, confidentiality refers to a professional standard of conduct that requires all professional in any field of psychology to not discuss information about their clients, …show more content…
In some US state legislatures they have created what it is called testimonial privilege in which prohibits any heath professional revealed in a court trial or quasi-judicial procedure, with certain exceptions, any patient’s or client’s confidential information obtained during the course of treatment. It is important to emphasize that the privilege only shelters the patient or client, not professionals. Professionals who miss this status can be sued by their patients, (Koocher & Keith-Spiegel, 2008; Metzner, n.d.). Nevertheless privileged statuses may be limited under certain