Reference no: EM13342219

Professional counselors must follow legal and ethical guidelines in order to protect their clients' or students' privacy and confidentiality. However, they also need to protect their clients or students from self-harm and harm by others, and they need to protect people from potentially dangerous clients or students. At times, these duties may limit a client's or student's right to confidentiality. State laws contain specific statutes or regulations that mandate when a counselor must break confidentiality to protect clients or students from harm; schools and agencies will also have specific guidelines and policies that must be followed in these cases.

Create a brief case scenario reflective of the work you will do as a professional counselor that describes a client or student who is expressing one of the following:

Thoughts about harming himself or herself.

Feelings about wanting to harm another person.

Descriptions of being physically abused at home.

Memories of being sexually abused by a neighbor.

Address all of the following in your case scenario:

Include the student's or client's age and the setting in which you are working.

Describe the specific steps you will take to assess the potential risk to or from your student or client.

If a minor has experienced abuse or is in jeopardy of being harmed, what guidelines will you follow to report this? Locate the specific laws in your state that address mandated reporting procedures and cite the sections of these laws that would guide your actions.

How will you address informed consent and any exceptions to confidentiality with your student or client, so that damage to the counseling relationship is minimized?

Include specific examples to illustrate your ideas, and support your discussion with references to state laws and regulations, ethical codes, and articles from the professional literature.