Tag: psychology

APA Convention in Orlando: Customers, colleagues, and more

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From Thursday August 2 through Sunday August 5, 2012, Synergistic Office Solutions exhibited at the American Psychological Association (APA) convention in Orlando. The last time we exhibited at APA was in New Orleans in 2006. As a New Orleanian, it was my way of thanking APA for holding the convention there so soon post-Katrina.

This time, the meeting was held in Orlando. Since the SOS headquarters is located in Clermont, FL, a mere 30 miles west of Orlando, we felt we should attend. We had a few other outstanding reasons to be there.

Three SOS customers also exhibited this year, and we definitely wanted to see and support them.

University of Missouri Community Psychological Service received a large grant that will allow them to expand their services. Dr. Rob Harris was at APA interviewing for their open positions for psychologists.

Alliant University - CSPP booth

Alliant International University – California School of Professional Psychology (CSPP) attends every year. According to Michael Newman, the Assistant Director of Alumni Relations, many CSPP alums attend the convention. For them, it is a great opportunity to reconnect with alumni and to talk with potential new students.

Southeast Psych is a private group psychology practice in Charlotte, NC. Though we had spoken with Dr. Frank Gaskill and Dr. Jonathan Feather many times since 2000 when they started using our software, we had never met. We do receive their monthly newsletter, so we knew that their approach to the practice of psychology is unique. How many practices do you know that have as one of their goals the pursuit of fun?

Dr. Feather and Dr. Verhaagen of Southeast Psych playing at APA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Southeast Psych has begun to do some consulting with others who also want to develop their Dream Practice. I was glad to join in some of the fun while there.

Kathy with Darth Vader and Storm Trooper

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I had a few other pleasant tasks while at the convention. I got to visit with and then hear the presentation of my long-time colleague and friend, Dr. Ellyn Kaschak, this year’s Carolyn Wood Sherif Award recipient. I attended a University of Florida reception for alumnae of the program in Clinical and Health Psychology (of which I am a graduate).

Trish and I hosted other visitors/friends at our booth.

Fred Coolidge, Ph.D.

Dr. Fred Coolidge is Seth’s cross-country riding buddy, Professor at University of Colorado – Colorado Springs, author and rock guitarist. Dr. Bob Neimeyer was Seth’s student while at University of Florida. He is Professor at University of Memphis, prolific author and frequent Continuing Education speaker.

Robert Neimeyer, Ph.D.

Finally, I attended a panel on women presidents of APA and the APA Presidential reception hosted by Dr. Suzanne Bennett Johnson, 2012 President of the American Psychological Association.

Suzanne Bennett Johnson, Ph.D. President, APA

Suzanne was an intern and then a post-doctoral fellow when I was a graduate student at University of Florida. We have worked together on the Board of Directors of the Florida Psychological Association over the years. She has had a distinguished career in Health Psychology practice and research, spending many years at U of F and then moving to the Florida State University College of Medicine. It was a special pleasure to attend the APA convention when a career-long colleague and friend was presiding. I’ll bet she had even more fun than we did!

Were you at APA? Do you have memorable convention moments you would like to share? Please do so below.

 

 

 

 

Change in Healthcare is Upon Us…Law or not

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In 1992, when Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States for the first time, I was a member of the Committee for the Advancement of Professional Practice (CAPP) of the American Psychological Association. CAPP is charged with general governance oversight of the Practice Directorate, the part of APA responsible for promoting “the practice of psychology and the availability and accessibility of psychological services, providing resources and services to practicing psychologists in all settings and to the public.”

Our first meeting immediately after the election was highly charged. Staff had been studying President Clinton’s healthcare proposals, and the notion of controlling cost through “managed care.”

President Clinton’s healthcare proposals did not fly, but the industry picked up the notion of controlling costs by managing the care provided to consumers, and psychological practice has never been the same. For private practitioners, “managed care” continues to be a primary obstacle to the practice of psychology. Costs might have been suppressed by managing care, but some would argue that the primary effect of the managed care revolution was the creation of a new industry that made money as the middle-men at the cost of providers. Indeed, after a few years of leveling of the costs of care, the rise has been renewed and expanded.

In mid-November, the Supreme Court of the U.S. agreed to hear an appeal of the Affordable Care Act, our nation’s most recent effort to reform our healthcare system.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear appeals from the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta, which is the only court to have struck down the individual mandate because it overstepped Congressional authority and wasn’t justified by the constitutional power “to regulate commerce” or “to lay and collect taxes.” FierceHealthPayer, November 18, 2011

According to editor Dina Overland of FierceHealthPayer newsletter, even a complete overturn of the law would have little significant impact. She believes that consumers like the changes the law is mandating and there is no stopping this train.

Mercom Capital Group, in their HIT Report of November 21, 2011, says the same thing about the massive changes in the healthcare arena at large. Basing their conclusions on a report by PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLC), Mercom reports that health organizations will continue to move forward with changes to their health technology and other innovations because the multiple drivers in the marketplace have finally come to a head. No matter the political or the financial uncertainties, PwC believes this movement will continue. These are changes consumers like, and the movement will continue no matter which market forces might change.

In their HIT Report of November 28, 2011, Mercom reports that Harvard and Aetna will ally to work to improve healthcare costs and quality. The two have formed a research collaborative focused on improving the quality and cost of healthcare. They will use bioinformatics, the interface of computer science and information technology with the fields of biology and medicine, to analyze healthcare data in innovative ways. They will focus on outcomes of various treatments considering quality and cost, factors that predict adherence to medical and drug treatments for chronic diseases, examining how claims and clinical data can be best used to predict disease and follow outcomes, as well as other treatments of data that will emerge over time.

Where is your organization in the midst of this dramatic change in how we manage healthcare? How do you see yourself participating in the sea change that is under way? Where does behavioral healthcare fit into this picture?

Just type in your thoughts below. Thanks for commenting.

Motivation: How do we generate it?

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I have been thinking a good deal lately about how to motivate myself and others in my life. When I was a psychotherapist, I spent lots of time helping patients understand their motivations and utilizing those motivations to help them create change in their lives. Knowing what drives us to do things is important to achieving any of our goals or satisfaction in our lives. Of course, my patients were in my office because they felt the need for change. They already had motivation, albeit a negative one…they were in pain…an internal state that they wanted to get rid of. But they did not know how to make change in their lives; they needed a different set of skills. That is what psychotherapy is good for.

I have not looked at the work on motivation in a long time. In order to write this article, I did what everyone who uses a computer today does….I Googled it. I repeatedly came upon the name of one individual and had to get more information about him. After all, he is not even a psychologist or other researcher.

Daniel Pink is a bestselling author who was at one time Al Gore’s chief speechwriter. His book, Drive, explores the psychological research on motivation and performance. And he finds that business and many people at large have ignored the results of this important research. We treat employees as if they must be rewarded or punished to try to motivate them to perform well…using the proverbial carrot and stick. The research, however, shows that rewards result in poorer performance if any degree of cognitive skill is needed to accomplish a task. Autonomy, mastery, and purpose are the motivators we need to understand.

I have checked Drive out of the library and plan to read it right away. I will let you know the details of what I learn. In the meantime, you can find out some of Dan Pink’s thoughts on motivation and what we do wrong by listening to his TED talk (18:40). If you want a bit more detail, you can listen to him talk to American Psychological Association members at the 2011 Psychologically Healthy Workplace Awards (38:36).

How do you motivate yourself? How do you motivate others? What secrets have you learned about motivating patients? What motivates you to read this? How can I motivate you to make comments?

Please share your thoughts below. Thanks.

 

Psychologists and EMR: Movement forward

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Last week I attended a continuing education workshop for psychologists at my local chapter of the Florida Psychological Association. Psychological Records: Basic Requirements and the (Forced?) Choice of EMRs was presented by Robert J. Porter, Ph.D., president of the Tampa Bay chapter and treasurer of Florida Psychological Association. Dr. Porter’s presentation was attended by about 30 psychologists and other mental health providers. The last FPA workshop on EMRs that I attended was over 10 years ago, and it was given by me. There were about five psychologists present at that workshop.

The difference in attendance speaks to multiple issues. First, Dr. Porter is an excellent presenter who talked broadly about EMRs. His years as a researcher and university professor combined with recent years in private practice give him great credibility. Secondly, the EMR landscape has changed hugely in the past decade with government requirements to migrate patient records to an EMR a distinct possibility.

The psychologists who are my age peers who used an EMR  loved computers and liked doing all their work there. Most of our age-mates would never have considered keeping records that could not be locked up in a file cabinet behind their locked office door. The younger psychologists who are now replacing us in the private practice community are not only willing to consider keeping their records electronically. . . they are willing to keep them online using a Software as a Service (SaaS) type product. The move from needing to hold the patient record in my hot little hands to allowing it to float out there in the cloud is a sea change.

While Dr. Porter presented a great deal of information in the two hours he spoke, there were several items I thought you might find interesting.

  1. The American Psychological Association published Record Keeping Guidelines in the December 2007 issue of the American Psychologist. If you are a psychologist and you keep records, you should read them. If you keep behavioral health records but are not a psychologist, you might take a look at them. Such Guidelines frequently become part of the standard of care in a professional community.
  2. The APA Guidelines recommend disclosure to the patient of your record keeping procedures, including the limitations of confidentiality of the records. Those limitations of confidentiality lead to a likely need to maintain a separate  record of care for each person you treat, including for each individual member of a family or couple. (Guideline 4)
  3. Ofer Zur, Ph.D., a licensed psychologist in California, offers extensive information about and continuing education on record keeping and many other aspects of behavioral health practice. [Retrieved 4/19/2011 from http://www.zurinstitute.com/recordkeepingguidelines.html.]
  4. Dr. Zur points out that a treatment plan usually includes problems or symptoms, a diagnosis, goals of treatment, interventions to be used to achieve the goals, and the rationale for use of those interventions.

 

I would add a quick note about the possibility of a requirement to keep records of psychological care in an EMR. At present, the only behavioral health providers who are Eligible Providers (EP) for ARRA funding to purchase an EMR are psychiatrists and nurse practitioners. Psychologists, social workers, mental health counselors and addiction professionals do not qualify, nor do psychiatric hospitals. While this may change, there is currenly no way for most mental health providers to obtain stimulus funds. At the same time, there is no requirement for them to move to an EMR, nor will they be penalized for not doing so (psychiatrists and nurse practitioners may be subjected to Medicare withholds). Fortunately, most of the products aimed at the private mental health practitioner are relatively inexpensive and can easily be obtained without resorting to government funding or a second mortgage on your house.

While an electronic medical record can be a powerful way to significantly increase the quality of the records maintained by you and your organization, you must know what you are required to maintain in the record. . . by the governmental jurisdictions and the professional guidelines to which you are subject.

How does your organization determine what goes in the client’s record? Who is responsible for those records? Are you using an EMR, a paper record, or some hybrid system?

Please share your thoughts on records in the Comments below.

Sleep Deprivation: The cost

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Two nights ago I woke up at 1:30 a.m. and did not fall back to sleep until 3:30 a.m. The room was too hot to sleep comfortably and I was awakened by a night sweat. I got up and cooled the room, but before I could fall back to sleep I was experiencing painful flushing caused by the niacin I take. Yikes! Today I am struggling with staying awake and trying to be productive.

According to surveys done between 1999 and 2004 by the National Sleep Foundation, 60% of adults report having difficulties sleeping a few nights a week. According to WebMD, some of the consequences of sleep deprivation can be:

  • Decreased performance and alertness
  • Memory and cognitive impairment
  • Stress on relationships
  • Poor quality of life
  • Occupational injury
  • Automobile injury

For many of us, irritability, poor decision making and decreased performance are the main problems. Yep, I have now started this article for the second time…my first try did not save properly.

According to sleep researchers, cognitive behavioral therapy can be as or more effective than the use of popular medications to solve sleep issues. Some of the recommendations for improved sleep include this list from the APA web site:

  • Keep a regular sleep/wake schedule
  • Don’t drink or eat caffeine four to six hours before bed and minimize daytime use
  • Don’t smoke, especially near bedtime or if you awake in the night
  • Avoid alcohol and heavy meals before sleep
  • Get regular exercise
  • Minimize noise, light and excessive hot and cold temperatures where you sleep
  • Develop a regular bed time and go to bed at the same time each night
  • Try and wake up without an alarm clock
  • Attempt to go to bed earlier every night for certain period; this will ensure that you’re getting enough sleep

I will definitely be heading to bed early tonight. I already do many of the other recommendations and usually sleep pretty well. Maybe that is why I am so discombobulated when my sleep is disturbed.

How often is sleep deprivation a problem for you? Has it become chronic insomnia? What do you do about it? How can we prevent this epidemic of sleep deprivation from undermining our lives?

Please share your experiences, your comments, your yawns 😉 below.