'The views expressed are the views of the writer, not necessarily those of BACP. Publication does not imply endorsement of the writer's view'

It was with great delight that I received my copy of the February journal devoted to working with children and young people. It felt very important that CPJ gave this much neglected and under resourced client group a voice.

I would like to endorse Sue Kegerreis's plea for more specialist training courses for counsellors wanting to work with Children and Young People. However, she and others may not be aware of the exciting, new initiative by the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP). A set of criteria for the training and registering of professionals in the area of Integrative Child Psychotherapy have now been established, we at CCPE are presently in the process of having our MA in Transpersonal Child Adolescent and Family Therapy accredited. The criteria for accreditation are necessarily very high given the need to train effective practitioners in this specialised area. Our Child MA course began in 1998 and is validated by De Montfort University.

I sincerely hope that BACP may consider in the near future recognising and accrediting such courses with a view to creating a separate register of Child and Adolescent Counsellors.

Angela Gruber
Child Adolescent and Family Programme Co-ordinator,
Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education

The correct term is "Disabled People". This is to reflect the social model of disability which states that it is the way that society is organised that "disables" a person. This is reflected in everything from the accessibility of buildings and services, to the attitudes of society. The social model states that what has been arranged can be arranged differently so that a person is not "disabled" by the environment in which they live, but can participate on equal terms with other people.

Diana Kingdom
DDA Advisor

Okay to tell your therapist everything? Apparently not, if you are a counsellor and affected by clients and their issues.

According to BACP advice, this is breaking confidentiality and thus unethical. Although each person's interpretation of the Framework can be different and as long as we consult fully with supervisors and colleagues, the baseline is that this is a non-agreed breach of confidence. And this is not about revealing client details, but any reference at all, including a snippet of their story or the process between you.

As a therapist of 25 years experience and a supervisor / trainer, I was very surprised to hear this. Like many others I have been brought up on 'take it to supervision and if brings up stuff for you that cannot be dealt with within that session, take it to therapy'. This has always seemed a sound guideline to me, and so important for counsellors in training. So often, a therapy session might start something like. "A client was talking about the impact of her parents' reaction to her breast cancer and I realised, I still have unfinished business with my…."

The Data protection act makes it inadvisable to process our responses in our client notes and this implication of the ethical framework inhibits our use of a confidential therapeutic relationship. Is this a move towards an objective medical model approach to counselling, where a relational and transparent stance, where we own our stuff as imperfect beings becomes far too dangerous to adopt in our working lives? I wonder what other counsellors think?

Graz Kowszun

EHS is real

This is the name of a website in Ireland run by a lady who is herself Electrically HyperSensitive (EHS). A 'Vermeer' as she nicknames the condition of isolation and detachment from ordinary life this causes because...........xxx.

I have been recruited to set up a similar support organisation for sufferers here in the UK because I do not suffer from EHS and will not therefore be likely to become so ill and debilitated I cannot help others as has happened before. We intend our new organisation 'ElectroSensitivity-UK' to flourish and grow as a support charity for victims, our application to the Charity Commission is in and our website is up and running at www.electrosensitivity.org.uk.

My purpose here is to alert counsellors and therapists to a real and genuine condition only slowly achieving recognition here but readily recognised in Sweden, Australia and other places. Probably most easily understood as an allergy and a similar condition to Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS) with which it often co-exists, it is triggered in a minority who are predisposed, in ways of which we are still ignorant, by electromagnetic fields of seemingly specific frequencies resonating with their own internal electrical balances in an acutely destabilising manner. The results present as a whole range of symptoms. What commences with migraine type headaches, facial rashes and eyestrain can progress, without avoidance, to severe and constant disabling pain and total dislocation from ordinary life as proximity to any electrical sources is recognised as the direct cause.

The important issue is that electrical hypersensitivity is real. It is not imagined, not a consequence of hypochondria or neurotic anxiety.

At a workshop of the Electrobiocompatibility Association with twenty-five acknowledged experts from different disciplines at the Royal Society for Medicine in Wimpole Street last September 17, this was the main issue. Not a single dissenting voice was heard doubting the reality of EHS as a genuine medical condition with this array of scientific and medical expertise. Four serious EHS sufferers gave moving personal accounts of their difficulties in obtaining diagnosis and treatment with disbelieving medical and caring authorities.

This is not of course to claim every self-diagnosed case is necessarily accurate. Neither are there clear and specific symptoms discernible in every individual, but a visit to our website would explain this further, or to Sweden's excellent organisation Feb.

There are cases of EHS sufferers being compulsorily sectioned and detained by disbelieving authorities after being prescribed painkillers, anti-depressants and tranquilisers in misguided efforts to assist. We as counsellors must not become complicit in this failure.

Rod Read
electrosensitivity@hotmail.com

'The views expressed are the views of the writer, not necessarily those of BACP. Publication does not imply endorsement of the writer's view'