Course Details
Course Description
NOTE: This 3 CE course has been approved for 1.5 hours of POST CPE credit. While each of the helping professions has its own distinct code of ethics that its members must follow, they all share common general principles and values to ensure their clients’ best interest and safety. Although this aim is straightforward in theory, it is challenging in practice to navigate the complex circumstances and, at times, dilemmas that arise throughout the course of work in human services. Ethical standards are often written in a necessarily broad way to address the variety of unpredictable ways that human relationships and contexts may interact and manifest. Scholarship and discourse to translate ethical standards into decision-making guidelines and practical application are needed, in addition to peer and supervisory consultation. Clinicians must take into consideration the context, cultural values, and individual characteristics of each client and situation they encounter when ethical concerns arise. This learning material, designed for social workers, psychologists, counselors, and marriage and family therapists, presents information about the ethical values, standards, and principles that guide client or patient care, as well as several guidelines for making ethical decisions when dilemmas inevitably arise. The learning material differentiates between violations and dilemmas and participants are offered an exploration of the intersection between ethical and legal requirements for practice. This learning material examines a wide variety of ethical challenges common to clinical practice and provides examples to apply these concepts to real world experience with clients. It also discusses current research on emerging concerns such as dual relationships, telehealth, and social media. Multiple case examples throughout this learning material provide opportunities to put these ethical considerations into practice, including the participant’s own specific work and case concerns.
Course Objectives
Ethics and Professional Codes of EthicsEthical Principals and Common Values
Confidentiality
Duties to Protect and Warn
Informed Consent
Professional and Cultural Competence
Dual and Consecutive Relationships
Boundary Issues
Emerging Concepts in Ethics
Ethical Decision-Making
Ethical Challenges in Practice
Summary
References