Consultation

I have my first week of the month consultations with the general public next week. My case manager, Maggie, has sent out the intake and consents forms to the scheduled people.

I don’t know what people want to talk with me about until I talk to them. So I offer general public consults the first week of every month to talk to people who want to talk to me. I’ll be holding my October consults next week.

Most of the time, I meet, we talk, and that’s my last involvement in their matter. Sometimes, after talking, the person talks to their attorney or involved mental health people and a second meeting is set up with Maggie between me and the relevant professionals.

My primary practice right now is serving as a second-opinion to attorneys regarding mental health reports in their matters. I apply the established scientific and professional knowledge of the discipline to the information I’m asked to review.

There’s an attorney in a matter who believes that the application of the established knowledge from professional psychology would benefit the court in its decision-making. The attorney submits the information to me for my review and I apply the established scientific and professional knowledge from clinical psychology to the information I’m asked to review.

Except for any parents, attorneys, or mental health professionals in Oregon. Sorry Oregon, you’re dark to Dr. Childress. I will provide no consultation to any Oregon resident, attorney, or mental health professional from now until forever. Talk to your licensing board about why they don’t want you consulting with Dr. Childress about your matter.

If you are a parent, I will speak with you once to find out what you want to talk with me about – but I’m not licensed in your state. My contact with you is limited. I can, however, talk to your surrounding professionals all you want, but just not so much with you.

If you’re a CA resident, I can possibly do more with you because I’m licensed in CA… but I can probably not do too much because I live in Washington state.

If you’ve spoken with your attorney and you think that you may want to involve my consultation in your matter to assist the court with its decision-making, you can schedule the first meeting with your attorney and me so we all meet together the first time.

If you know what you want, we can talk about what you want. If you don’t know what you want, we can talk about what you may want.

There’s all sorts of helpful informational Handouts on the Attorney Resources page of my Consulting Website (drcachildress-consulting.com). There’s also information for mental health professionals on the Mental Health Consultation page of my Consulting Website.

If you’re a mental health professional with a difficult case of family conflict and you’d like consultation, you can schedule a consultation time during the first week of any month though the Scheduling Calendar on my Consulting Website.

Consultation is a good thing. It’s indicated as appropriate in Standards 2.01(a)(c)(d) of the APA ethics code, and is specifically addressed in Standard 3.09 Cooperation with Other Professionals

3.09 Cooperation with Other Professionals
When indicated and professionally appropriate, psychologists cooperate with other professionals in order to serve their clients/patients effectively and appropriately.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine produced a paper on Improving Diagnosis in Health Care in which they recommend consultation.

From Improving Diagnosis in Health Care: “Clinicians may refer to or consult with other clinicians (formally or informally) to seek additional expertise about a patient’s health problem. The consult may help to confirm or reject the working diagnosis or may provide information on potential treatment options. If a patient’s health problem is outside a clinician’s area of expertise, he or she can refer the patient to a clinician who holds more suitable expertise. Clinicians can also recommend that the patient seek a second opinion from another clinician to verify their impressions of an uncertain diagnosis or if they believe that this would be helpful to the patient.”

Improving Diagnosis in Health Care
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK338596/

Diagnosis guides treatment. The treatment for cancer is different than the treatment for diabetes. What is the diagnosis guiding the recommendations and treatment interventions being made for your family?

Are they making recommendations for cancer or diabetes? What is their diagnosis of the problem (pathology)?

Is the diagnosis a shared (induced) persecutory delusion? Is the diagnosis Child Psychological Abuse (DSM-5 V995.51)?

Was a proper risk assessment for possible child abuse conducted?

Or perhaps you want to talk with me about ADHD. Or perhaps you want to talk about autism-spectrum issues. Or perhaps you want to talk about depression or anxiety disorders. Or perhaps you want to talk about baseball. It’s your time to talk with me about anything you want to talk about. I’ll meet with anyone once to find out what you want to talk about – except if you live in Oregon.

Good luck Oregon.

All mental health professionals have duty to protect obligations. Did they conduct a proper risk assessment for child abuse to the appropriate differential diagnoses for each parent?

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, CA PSY 18857