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VAMFT Newsletter (v. 3, no. 2)

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Caring for the Commonwealth
(Volume 3, Isssue 2)
May 1998
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Inside This Issue:


A Letter from the President
by Anne Prouty, President

Spring is upon us and 1998 is blooming everywhere. I hope this season of rebirth and beauty inspires all of us to renew our pledges to those people, ideas, and projects that we value. The Board and other volunteers of VAMFT are already hard at work on several projects. Some of these projects include: two new directories, a new web page, and legislative, regulatory, and public relations work. The two new and larger projects include building and sponsoring networking and conference events for VAMFT members and of course, working toward third party reimbursement and other issues of parity. The VAMFT Board will be considering a dues increase not more than 10% at the May 29th Board meeting. The increase would go into effect in January 1999 and the money would help fund all of these worthwhile proposals. All of these projects are addressed somewhere in this newsletter. I hope you'll find helpful information here and get excited about all of the goings on with VAMFT in 1998!!

 
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Update on LMFT Regulations
by Anne Prouty

The Board of Licensensed Professional Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, and Substance Abuse Professionals will meet at The Williamsburg Hospitality House, 415 Richmond Road, Williamsburg, Virginia on May 13, 14, and 15th. In order to assure that the regulations are a reflection of the Virginia legislator's intent and the national standards of the profession of Marriage and Family Therapy, public comment will be heard at the beginning of the meeting on Wednesday, May 13, 1:00 pm. If needed, to conclude the business of the board, the Thursday, May 14th 1:00 pm meeting will offer an opportunity to discuss the proposed changes to the LMFT regulations. The Board will meet at 9:00 am on Friday, May 15th to concider adopting the amendments to the Regulations governing the practice of marriage and family therapy. If you are interested in testifying or attending, please contact Ms. Janet Delorme at (804) 662-9912. You may also get on the Licensing Board's mailing list by calling this number and requesting so.

Amendment 18 VAC 115-50-50 proposed at the previous meeting of the Licensing Board included reducing the educational requirements for licensure by two courses in the Areas of (a) marriage and family studies and (b) marriage and family therapy, and the internship requirement was reduced from 300 clinical hours to 240 clinical hours. The clinical requirement to earn the LMFT is 1000 out of the final 4000 hours and remains the same. Clinical Supervisor requirements were developed and proposed to the Board. The latter would not go into effect until the year 2000.

 
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COAMFTE Approved Supervision Course

Sandra Stith, Ph.D., L.M.F.T. will provide a Clinical Supervision course during the summer of 1998. This course will meet part of the requirements for the AAMFT Approved Supervisor designation as well as the proposed Virginia 2000 requirement for L.M.F.T. supervisors to have a course on clinical supervision. At this time this course is offered only at the Virginia Tech Northern Virginia Center (VT NVC) in Falls Church. However, the Virginia Tech faculty are looking into providing clinical training opportunities such as this course via distance learning technology around the Commonwealth of Virginia in the near future. Please call the VT NVC Marriage and Family Therapy program at (703) 538-8460 for more information.

 
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On the Road to Parity: Stage II
by Anne Prouty

As of May 5, 1998, we now have 410 Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The grandparenting period will close on July 7, 1998, and the newest form of the regulations for becoming a licensed marriage and family therapist will go into effect. I am very excited because these regulations also contain requirements for providing supervision for persons earning their license and the board has adopted the National Examination of Marriage and Family Therapy. As Stage 1, obtaining licensure and sound regulations, has been achieved, it is now time to begin getting the word out and educating ourselves and the Commonwealth about the field of Marriage and Family Therapy and the competencies of Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists.

What does the VAMFT Board have planned for the coming year? We are currently recruiting people for committees and brainstorming an action plan. We have determined the 10 top mental health care payers to approach for third party reimbursement for LMFTs. We need to tap into the resources of our membership to succeed:

  • DO YOU HAVE A GOOD RELATIONSHIP WITH A THIRD PARTY REIMBURSER?
  • DO YOU KNOW A LEGISLATOR?
  • DO YOU HAVE MARKETING, NETWORKING ORGANIZATIONAL, OR OTHER SKILLS THAT WE NEED?
  • WE NEED YOU!!!!!!!!!


We are looking for people for various jobs, some will take an hour and some a few hours. We are also looking for volunteers who have experience working with corporations and legislators to go with Board members to these meetings.
 
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VOLUNTEER TO GIVE AN HOUR TO VAMFT IN OUR WORK TOWARD PARITY

Contact your regional Vice President or any Board Member to learn how you can get aboard!!!! In addition to working with the board, the following things are what each one of us can do in our everyday professional lives to help with our parity efforts.

Legislative:

  1. Go meet our legislative representatives in both the Senate and the House of Delegates. They need to know who we are and what we care about, especially when we are not asking for anything. Give them a copy of the AAMFT brochures "A Consumer's Guide to Marriage and Family Therapy."
  2. During elections, offer to stuff envelopes, hold a coffee, or do something for a couple of hours for a candidate in your district.
  3. Write a check to a candidate and include with it a short note that mentions our profession. Remember, you still get up to a $500.00 tax credit per person for campaign contributions. Candidates DO remember the little checks too!!!


Colleagues &Potential Referral Sources:

  1. Identify ourselves as a Marriage and Family therapist at professional meetings and conferences
  2. Talk about the competencies of Marriage and Family Therapists as mental health care providers- we can provide much more than just marriage therapy!!!
  3. Talk with, give presentations for, or take to lunch potential referral sources.
  4. Provide them with copies of the AAMFT publications: "When to Refer to a Marriage and Family Therapist" and "A Consumer's Guide to Marriage and Family Therapy."


Third Party Reimbursers:

  1. Emphasize our academic and clinical training that enabled you to become a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist: a 60 hour graduate program with strong courses in clinical theory, practice and ethics; 4000 hours of supervised clinical experience containing a minimum of 1000 hours providing therapy with 200 hours of supervision.
  2. After they are pubished July 7, 1998, provide a copy of the new regulations of licensed marriage and family therapists to managed care companies.
  3. Attend workshops and conferences to learn how to market our work to managed care companies. Talk to other professionals who belong to the panel or provide services for the company: get their advice. Think about purchasing AAMFT's "Practice Strategies" (in addition to the Journal of Marriage and Family Therapy), "The Managed Care Sourcebook," or other resources geared toward helping members tap this mental health care market.


Best wishes to all of you!!
 
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Legislative Committee Update
by Wally Scott, PhD, LMFT, LPC

I have just recently returned from the April AAMFT Division Leadership Conference in Washington, D.C. We are nearing the completion of the 1998 Legislative Session, and I am nearing the end of my first 4 months as President-Elect and Chair of the Legislative Committee. I am aware that we in VAMFT have much to celebrate, e.g., we have licensure in the State of Virginia (we are one of 40 divisions in AAMFT with licensure), and we are one of the larger divisions in AAMFT (only 24 divisions have over 100 or more members). It has been a long road to licensure. Many have led the way. As was reported and affirmed at the Leadership Conference, we can collectively catch our breath, but this is only the beginning. The larger goal for us is "professional parity" which has a number of components. We need to set up a committee structure that is prepared to deal with the multi-facets of "professional parity". One aspect of this larger goal involves legislative issues. I would like to outline some of my thoughts as Legislative Chair for VAMFT.

We are one of the larger divisions in AAMFT. We have a cross-professional membership of many disciplines, i.e., we are not solely MFTs, but consist of psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, counselors and nurses. Obviously, there is much talent and leadership in our membership. I am frequently humbled and know there is much that is larger than I. My legislative task is one of those things. From the legislative side, I will continue to need your help. Our first move may be to step back in order to step forward, i.e., we need to marshal our resources as we move forward. To do this we need to address a number of issues:

  1. Who do you know? Who do you know who may have legislative influence (e.g., legislators, cabinet members, or state regulators)? Have you met, and do you know your state representatives? With the completion of the 1998 Legislative Session, our representatives will be returning home. Now is the time to take some time to drop in on them and introduce ourselves. We can begin to educate them about who we are, so that we may be resources to them in future sessions. Also, it is nice to simply say hello, rather than waiting to meet them when we are asking for something.
  2. The membership needs to be organized. As an LPC in Virginia, I am on a phone-fax-email tree and during the legislative sessions receive frequent updates and requests to send letters of support and/or opposition to my state representatives. As of present, we, LMFTs, do not have any such means to "get the word out" to our membership (other than through this newsletter). We need to organize in such a way that we too can "get the word out" to our membership immediately when necessary.
  3. What will be our strategies for influencing legislation? We need to track legislation before the General Assembly that: a) directly affects the professional practice of marital and family therapy; and b) involve issues regarding the family and systemic thinking in general. I am not sure that our best strategy is to flood our representatives with form letters or phone calls every time we need to take a position. There may be times when we need to mobilize our network and we need to be ready. I believe that having personal contact and relations with our representatives is key. We need to develop relationships where we are looked at as the experts on issues related to families, and systems. As such we will become resources to our state representatives. We would like to track and give comment to bills and legislative issues that involve family and systemic thinking as a way to propound our ideas, frame of reference and clinical paradigm. It may be helpful to do this in matters where we do not have to take a political stand‹in a less heated environment. If we can do this consistently over time, our ways of knowing will become increasing part of the "dominant knowledges".
  4. We need two-way orientation with our lobbyist. Our lobbyist David Bailey has been instrumental in helping us attain licensure. His assistant, Bonnie Atwood, is our key contact person and will track most of our legislative issues in the future. In order to more effectively meet this challenge it will be important to better orient Bonnie to "who we are", "where we have been and where we want to go", "what we do", and "what we are most interested in". This will allow Bonnie to better track bills. As a means to better orient Bonnie, we can:
    1. send her AAMFT/VAMFT material that addresses our history, purpose, focus and interests; and
    2. develop a list of "key words" she can use in key searches of legislation.

    Also, prior to the next legislative session, the legislative committee and other key VAMFT members need to have a "legislative orientation" to familiarize us with the legislative process.
  5. We need to combine our voices.Many key clinical and mental health issues are structured in such a way that the larger family of mental health providers are fractured and split. This often assures defeat of legislation. It also weakens the position of mental health providers by communicating that we are chiefly concerned with our self-interest rather than the health of individuals and families in the Commonwealth. Building better rapport and relationships with sibling mental health professions will certainly help when we take stands on key legislative, and regulative issues. Many of our key battles have been and are with other clinical professions. We will need this political capital when dealing with upcoming key issues, e.g., pushing for vendorship and the possible battles with third party payers which will be deflected into more turf battles amongst sibling professions. Legislatively, this goal can be pursued by identifying legislation where we can support other clinical groups (social workers, counselors, clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, and mental health nurses). Additionally, we can create greater rapport by sharing training and educational opportunities.


If you have any questions, comments, or ideas, please contact me. My e-mail address is: wscott@runet.edu; my work phone number is: 540-563-5316; my FAX number is: 540-563-5254. I look forward to working with you over the coming years.
 
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VAMFT Clinical Member Survey: Preliminary Results

With 72 out of a possible 306 clinical members repsonding, we had a 23% return rate. Many thanks to all of you who returned your surveys!!! As resported in the previous Newletter, Dr. Miranda Breit won the drawing for half of her registration to the 1998 Annual AAMFT conference in Dallas.

This Practice Readiness Survey is part of an international project being done by the Central AAMFT office. The results are currently being integrated and analyzed. Tentative results of the survey for our Commonwealth indicate the following:

  • The majority of respondents are in solo, private practice and provide about 20 sessions of therapy per week. Respondents in group practice were a close runner up and several people work in more than one setting.
  • The largest portion of their practice is with individuals (60%), followed by couples and families (37%), and lastly with groups (3%).
  • The age of clients seen represented almost the entire human lifespan with the average age of clients represented in a bi-modal peaks of 14 and 40 years of age.
  • Respondents are, on average, members of 1 to 5 managed care panels, but earn a majority of their income through direct pay from clients (38%), with managed care coming in a close second (average of 33%), "Other" third party payers at an average of 17%, and Champus bringing up the end at 14%. The remaining parts of people's income were supplemented with things like providing supervision, EAPs, and business consultations.
  • Optimism and hard work prevails as an overwhelming majority feel that you will be able to achieve your professional three year goals.
  • MFTs are looking to the division to: obtain third party reimbursement and other issues of parity; provide more networking opportunities such as townmeetings, state chapters, and a state conference; and educate the public, legislators, and mental health care providers about the nature and value of the field of marriage and family therapy and our competencies to treat a wide variety of mental health concerns.


 
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