Psychologist: 5 guidelines follow to choose a good psychologist
The five guidelines you can follow to choose a Good psychologist
For Upon |Choosing a psychologist or psychotherapist who is going to offer us his sessions may seem like a simple task in a time when the internet allows us to quickly locate the closest consultation. For example, by clicking https://www.betterhelp.com/advice/psychotherapy/im-looking-for-psychotherapy-near-me-what-are-the-best-options/, we can find more information on what types of psychotherapy are available, and how to find one near us.
If we live in a small population, we may only have to find out about which mental health professionals practice in our locality, and if we are in a large urban nucleus we will continue to have many tools to inform us about all the nearby consultations. However, things get complicated when we introduce the variable “quality” into the equation.
Choosing a good psychologist is not always an easy task, since there are many factors to take into account and some of them depend on the specific type of service we are looking for.
Tips for Choosing a good psychologist
Of course, each case deserves to be studied and it is impossible to give specific keys to select the best of all professionals without knowing the characteristics of the patient and the psychologists available in the area. However, you can follow some general guidelines that will help you choose a good psychologist.
Here are the five guidelines:
- Make sure he’s a psychologist
It seems like a very obvious point, but it is worth bearing in mind. However, it is not true: nowadays it is possible to present oneself as a “psychotherapist” or “therapist” without having completed a university degree in psychology. Cases of labor intrusion have been reported.
Someone who claims to be a psychotherapist does not have to be a psychologist, although a psychologist can be a psychotherapist. To be sure that the person offering you the sessions has university training in psychology, you can check if he has a collegiate number and an official university degree.
- Check that he has a specialization in what you are looking for
There are many types of psychologists, and not all of them have to be right for what you are looking for. To begin with, you should find out if the professional who is going to treat you is specifically trained in clinical psychology since there are also psychologists whose specialization is focused on marketing, laboratory research, or Human Resources. Keep in mind that, depending on the country in which you live, to be a clinical psychologist a university degree may be sufficient or you may also have to complete at least a post-university master’s degree.
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Find out about the type of psychotherapeutic approach offered
A psychologist can offer psychotherapeutic approaches that do not currently have solid evidence about their effectiveness, such as past-life therapy and other alternative therapies. This is no reason to discard their services, but it is worth bearing in mind that certain practices do not have the backing of science. Alternative therapies can be more or less useful depending on each case since the usefulness or not is determined by the patient through their own subjectivity, but a good psychologist will not pass one of these practices through ways of intervening with empirically proven efficacy.
Before choosing a psychologist, you should bear in mind that the form of psychological treatment that has the greatest scientific endorsement is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, although there are treatments that have been shown to be effective in addressing specific disorders. That is why the best thing you can do is ask for information on the degree of the scientifically proven effectiveness of the treatments offered and, from that point, decide in one direction or another.
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Make sure confidentiality is guaranteed
It never hurts to remember that during sessions the confidentiality of everything you say or do must be guaranteed. As a general rule, your personal data cannot be disclosed by any professional psychologist or by any company formed by psychologists. If this confidentiality is violated in any way, that fact may be a cause for complaint.
- You must sign an informed consent document
Before starting therapy, you should be given a dossier with information about the services available and, specifically, the type of therapy you choose. Attached to this type of dossier must be the informed consent document, which you sign as you are aware of what will be done during the sessions.
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