Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy and the Issue of Confidentiality
by the BCP Working Group on Confidentiality
There is concern in the UK that culturally and politically the balance between the public interest and an individual's right to confidentiality is shifting towards public interest having greater weight, as evidenced in recent legislation. The British Confederation of Psychotherapists has set up a working group to review the situation and make policy proposals.
We feel that it is vital that we, as a profession, should be thinking through and articulating the centrality of confidentiality in psychoanalytic psychotherapy, and continuing to use this thinking in lobbying the judiciary and legislative bodies, politicians and civil servants, to influence the framing of social care and mental health legislation.
We are also concerned to support individual psychotherapists who find themselves faced with demands for disclosure of information about their patients. Through the member organisations of the BCP, we are investigating how great a problem this is, and considering the feasibility of setting up systems to offer professional, and perhaps financial, backup where legal action needs to be taken to try to protect confidentiality.
As part of this process, we would be very interested to hear about European experience in this area.
•
Is disclosure of information about patients in psychotherapy a problem
in your country?
• Do
any requirements to report on patients to police or other public agencies
cause difficulties clinically?
• If
so, how do you deal with this?
• Does
it affect the kind of records you keep?
• Do
your professional bodies consider these issues as ethical dilemmas?
• What
support is there for psychotherapists who wish to protect patients' rights
to confidentiality by not complying with or arguing against demands for
disclosure, by bodies such as the courts or insurance companies?
The Working
Group would be very glad to hear from any colleagues on these matters.
Please contact Brenda Peover (BCP Working Group on Confidentiality) at
bp@melrose.globalnet.co.uk.
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