- Prompt: Adam is a professional counselor with over 25 years of clinical experience. The LPCC had been counseling a 14-year-old female client (“the client”) for approximately eight months. Due to ongoing parental neglect by her mother, the client was well-known to the foster care system and had been in and out of foster care most of her life. She had recently been placed in a home with a young couple who were new to the foster care system. The client was being followed by a multidisciplinary foster care team. Her history included physical, emotional, and sexual abuse by her mother’s boyfriends and close family members. She also expressed strong abandonment issues due to being left for months at a time with friends, neighbors, and anyone else who would agree to care for her. The foster parents did not have children of their own but had four other foster children in the home, all of whom were young teenage girls. While counseling one of the other foster care children who lived in the home, the child casually mentioned to the LPCC that the 14-year-old female client and the foster father spent a substantial amount of time together and often were alone. The insured LPCC attempted to obtain further details from the child about the relationship, but the child was evasive with her details and was not able to recall any specific examples of the two being alone. The LPCC had been counseling this child for several years and was aware that the child had made several accusations of being abused, all of which, upon investigation, were deemed to be false. Based upon this history and the fact that the client had not conveyed any concerns, the LPCC did not report the foster child’s statements to the state case workers or document these interactions in the client’s healthcare information record.
- Subsequently, the mother of the client (plaintiff) requested a meeting with the LPCC. During the meeting, the mother reported that her child (the client) had been in a sexual relationship with the foster father for the last five to six months. The LPCC admitted that she had a ‘gut feeling’ that something was going on, especially since another foster child in the home had made comments about the client and foster father spending time alone. The LPCC apologized several times for not questioning the client about the foster father in greater detail and not being more proactive in identifying red flags of abuse. Without the LPCC’s knowledge, the mother recorded the discussion, which she provided to the plaintiff’s attorney. Immediately following the meeting with the mother, the LPCC contacted the client’s case worker. The caseworker confirmed that the mother had reached out to her a few months ago and requested that the department conduct an investigation of potential abuse of her daughter. The case worker reported to the LPCC that an investigation had been ongoing but that she failed to mention it to the LPCC. Initially, the case worker felt that the mother was just causing trouble. She stated that it wasn’t until the foster mother reported that she was divorcing her husband, and had her concerns about the possibility of abuse, that the case worker began an investigation in earnest. The investigation by the state health department found that three of the four teenage girls in the home were being sexually abused by the foster father. (From HPSO, 2024).
- What mistakes were made in this case study? How should the counselor have responded? Use your textbook, the ACA code of ethics, journal articles, and Scripture to help support your answers/responses.
- Requirements: 2 pages, double-spaced, APA format. Note that title page and/or references pages do not count toward the final page count
Assessment Description As a practicum and internship student, what professional organization can you join? Are there benefits and services to you as a member? Identify activities you can be a part of.
Assessment Description As a practicum and internship student, what professional organization can you join? Are there benefits and services to you as a member? Identify activities you can be a part of. Discuss one current issue relevant to the profession.Note: These items are usually listed on the professional organization’s website, but