Privacy and confidentiality are fundamental principles in counseling, crucial for establishing a trusting and supportive therapeutic relationship. Maintaining privacy and confidentiality ensures that clients feel safe and secure in sharing their most personal and sensitive information with their counselor.

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Confidentiality plays a crucial role in counseling because it is essential for creating an effective and trusting environment. Clients need to feel secure enough to openly share their thoughts, feelings, and experiences without worrying about judgment or the risk of disclosure. Trust is essential to honesty and honesty is crucial for effective therapeutic interventions.

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Counselors abide by ethical codes and legal obligations to protect the privacy of their clients. Breaching confidentiality without explicit consent can erode trust and hinder therapeutic progress.

When clients feel safe to explore their sensitive issues, concerns, and challenges without the fear of repercussions, they facilitate a more accurate assessment of their needs and collaborate in the development of tailored interventions.  There are, however, limits to confidentiality in counseling.

 

Some Limits to Confidentiality Include:

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• Suspected child abuse or dependent adult or elder abuse requires me to report this to the appropriate authorities immediately.

•  A court of law may subpoena confidential client information.

• If a client is threatening serious bodily harm to another person, I must notify the police and inform the intended victim.

• If a client intends to harm themselves, I will enlist their cooperation in ensuring their safety. If they do not cooperate, I will take further measures provided to me by law to ensure their safety.

 

Technical Privacy Issues:

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What information do we collect when you buy a product or subscribe to a service?

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• We collect information from you when you place an order, email me, use the "Contact Me" form, subscribe to our newsletter, or respond to a survey.

• When ordering or paying for services from our site, you may be asked to enter your name, email address, mailing address, phone number, or credit card information (when purchasing something online or paying for services).

• We may use any of the information we collect from you in the following ways: 

  • To improve our website (we continually strive to improve our website offerings based on the information and feedback we receive from you.)

  • To improve customer service (your information helps us to respond more effectively to your customer service requests and support needs.)

  • We will not sell, exchange, transfer, or give your information to any other company for any reason whatsoever, without your consent, other than for the express purpose of delivering the purchased product or service requested.

  • We may email you with pertinent information about subjects you have previously expressed interest in. You may opt-out at any time.

 

How do we protect your information? 

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• We implement a variety of security measures to maintain the safety of your personal information when you place an order.

• PayPal offers the use of a secure server. All sensitive credit information is transmitted via Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology and then encrypted when you log into PayPal to make a purchase. PayPal stores your credit card information on their servers--not ours. PayPal only provides us with your email address and the product you purchased. We receive payment from PayPal without ever seeing your financial information.

• We may use cookies to recognize your browser and capture other pertinent information about your visit. Cookies compile aggregate (non-identifying) data about site traffic and interaction so that we can offer better site experiences and tools in the future.

• We do not sell, trade, or transfer your personally identifiable information to outside parties except for trusted third parties who assist us in operating our website, conducting our business, or serving you, so long as those parties agree to keep this information confidential. We may also release your information when we believe it is appropriate to comply with the law, enforce our site policies, or protect our or others' rights, property, or safety. We may also provide non-personally identifiable visitor information to other parties for marketing, advertising, or other uses.

 

Third-party links:

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• Occasionally, we may include or offer third-party products or services on our website. These third-party sites have separate and independent privacy policies. We have no responsibility or liability for the content and activities of these linked sites. When you click on others' links, their privacy policies apply to your information. Nonetheless, we seek to protect the integrity of our site and welcome any feedback about these sites.

• When we recommend other services and products using third-party links, we may receive a fee from the third party (e.g., Amazon.)

 

Children's Online Privacy Protection Act Compliance:

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• We do not treat or work with children.  Our website, products, and services are all directed to adults.

 

Online Privacy Policy Only:

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• This online privacy policy applies only to information collected through our website and not to information collected offline.

• HIPAA and other state/federal statutes protect your confidentiality (as indicated above.) 

 

Your Consent:

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• By using our site, you consent to our privacy policy.

 

Changes to our Privacy Policy:

• If we decide to change our privacy policy, we will post those changes on this page.

 

This text was modified from www.freeprivacypolicy.com