Informed Consent and Confidentiality

As a psychologist at any level, you are expected to seek informed consent from your client. While we do have consent forms that we send to clients, you need to know that consent is not a signature on a document, rather, it is an ongoing process of ensuring that the client understands and agrees to the therapy process, including benefits and risks. That is your responsibility.

As well as checking the consent forms on file, we encourage you to take note of this on Power Diary. There is a template called consent which you can complete.

Checklist of things to discuss with your client:

1. Confidentiality

• What is confidentiality
• Limits to confidentiality (Risk of Harm, Subpoena, Provisional Psychologists Supervisor)
• Negotiating how to share information with parents if seeing a minor (ie. Sharing resources, not specific conversational content)

1. Record keeping

• How we store information and how long for (7 years, or until the age of 25 for minors)

1. Who has rights to information

• Multiple clients (ie. Shared custody, other parent has the right to access information, are there any court orders in place?)

1. Parental Consent (if applicable)

• Talking about parent who is not present.

1. Session length

• Discuss 50-minute time slot unless otherwise stated (ie. If coming for assessment, this may be negotiated differently)

1. Provide opportunity for questions to clarify

Note: This process looks different for each clinician. The importance is ensuring that you have clearly outlined the above areas so the client is able to be informed as they progress through whatever the therapeutic relationship might look like.