Clinically Speaking

Spring Conference, February 28, 2009

"The Muddy Waters of Ethics"

Participants will learn to recognize ethical "hot zones" in clinical practice and develop strategies to avoid them, as well as engage in ethical auditing of clinical supervision and make ethically sound supervisory decisions, especially in the areas of parallel process and risk management. After this stimulating presentation, we will have a networking luncheon. In the afternoon, we will have "Legislative Updates" by Mark Hanna, JD, and Kathy Rider, LCSW, BCD.

Please join us as we return to the Lower Colorado River Authority in Austin, Texas. Registration starts at 8:30 a.m.

Members in the News

Major Peter E. Bauer USAR MS, clinical social worker and member of the Texas Society for Clinical Social Work, has been recalled to service in support of the military operations ongoing in Iraq. Peter is a nationally known expert on PTSD in the military. In April of this year Peter did a presentation on PTSD at the 2006 Tri-Service Combat Stress Conference at Camp Pendleton, California, and he will be presenting again this year at the 2006 Uniformed Services Social Worker Conference in Arlington, Virginia on August 2, 2006. Currently Peter is working in the substance abuse program in the Dwight Eisenhower Medical Center at Fort Gordon, Georgia doing clinical assessments and treatment with patients, and training on relapse prevention for patients and staff. TSCSW is proud of Peter and of the contribution he is making to the understanding and treatment of PTSD and substance abuse in the military.

Alerts

National Provider Identifier
The National Provider Identifier, or NPI, is the new provider number mandated by HIPPA to go into effect by 2007. Clinical social workers, as mental health providers, are required to obtain an NPI. Most health plans will be required to accept and use the NPI in standard transactions by May 23, 2007. It is easy to apply. On the web go to: nppes.cms.hhs.gov to apply online; or call 800 465-3203. You will be issued a ten digit NPI number that, when it goes into effect, will make dealing with insurance companies a little easier.

Clinical Social Work Association
The Clinical Social Work Federation, the national organization of state clinical societies of which TSCSW has been a member, has been dissolved and replaced by a new clinical social work association. Members of the Texas Society for Clinical Social Work will continue to have access to the clinical journal and all the other membership benefits they are accustomed to receiving. Members who have their malpractice insurance with CPH & Associates will have no disruption of coverage because of the dissolution of the clinical federation. It is not necessary, nor has it ever been necessary, to be a member of the CSWF or the new clinical social work association to purchase malpractice insurance from CPH & Associates.