Tag Archives: Wellness

Wellness

Behind the Book: Wellness Counseling: A Holistic Approach to Prevention and Intervention

Compiled by Bethany Bray March 18, 2019

“Each area of an individual’s life inevitably affects other areas,” write Jonathan H. Ohrt, Philip B. Clarke and Abigail H. Conley in the preface to their new book Wellness Counseling: A Holistic Approach to Prevention and Intervention. Mental health practitioners who target a treatment plan to only one aspect of a client’s life “neglect to recognize the interplay/interconnectedness of the different components that compose the well-being of our clients.”

“When I am counseling a client and reflect on the wellness model during an intake session or goal setting, I am prompted to ask not only about the presenting concern but also about factors such as the client’s religion/spirituality; gender; and physical, emotional, social and mental well-being,” Clarke explains in the books first chapter.

With that in mind, the authors write, it is imperative that counselors are able to articulate the profession’s connection to wellness, both to their clients and to other professionals. After all, the term “wellness” is in the very definition of counseling and is “an inextricable part of our professional identity,” write Ohrt, Clarke and Conley.

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Ohrt is an associate professor and counselor education program coordinator at the University of South Carolina. Clarke is a licensed professional counselor and faculty member in the Department of Counseling at Wake Forest University. Conley is an assistant professor in the Department of Counseling and Special Education at Virginia Commonwealth University and an affiliate faculty member in the university’s Institute for Women’s Health.

Wellness Counseling: A Holistic Approach to Prevention and Intervention was published by the American Counseling Association in December 2018. CT Online sent the co-authors some questions via email to learn more about this resource.

Q+A: Wellness Counseling

Responses written by co-authors Jonathan H. Ohrt, Philip B. Clarke and Abigail H. Conley

“Wellness” is often thrown around as a buzzword in our culture. How would you define wellness as it relates to counseling?

In our book, we utilize Jane Myers, Thomas Sweeney and Melvin Witmer’s definition of wellness [from their Journal of Counseling & Development article “The Wheel of Wellness Counseling for Wellness: A Holistic Model for Treatment Planning”] to guide our approach, which is that wellness is “a way of life oriented toward optimal health and well-being, in which body, mind and spirit are integrated by the individual to live life more fully within the human and natural community.”

Building off of this definition, we conceptualize a five-domain model of wellness that connects mind, body, spirit, connection and emotion [and] that highlights the interconnectedness of these domains within the whole self. Because of this holistic approach, one small change in one area can lead to positive changes in others. Thus, a client’s strengths are just as important, if not more so, than their struggles.

Finally, a key part of a wellness counseling approach is helping a client work toward their own optimal level of harmony both within and among each domain rather than [pursue] the often elusive idea of balance.

In the book, you all mention that wellness goes hand in hand with prevention. What do you want counselors to know about this intersection?

Prevention models in health care (e.g., primary, secondary and tertiary prevention) and education (multitiered systems of support) start with a focus on providing preventive interventions and education to avoid problems from occurring. These models emphasize healthy behaviors, decision-making, coping strategies, and strength and resiliency building.

From a wellness perspective, counselors can focus on prevention by assessing their clients holistically and collaboratively developing goals for clients to work toward optimal physical and mental health prior to the onset of problems. Goals can include physical health goals, mental health goals and goals related to the clients’ social functioning and spirituality. Counselors who focus on wellness can also advocate for policies that help promote wellness for individuals within various systems.

What tips would you share to help practitioners remember to step back and take a look at the client’s whole picture and not just the presenting problem?

Wellness models are one of the most useful tools to ensure that counselors consider the whole client. Utilize wellness models for client conceptualization and during sessions with clients. This will remind you to examine the client’s presenting problem from multiple perspectives.

For example, what (if any) spiritual, physical or cognitive components factor into the presenting concern? Inviting the client to reflect in this way communicates to them the importance of viewing themselves holistically. You can then discuss client strengths across wellness areas.

Counselors can also share with clients that they utilize a wellness-based approach during the informed consent process. As a self-awareness activity to solidify the relevance of wellness, you may want to write and periodically update your own wellness plan that consists of areas for improvement, strengths and goals.

Another fun and helpful exercise for counselors is to view television shows and reflect on the multifaceted nature of the stressors and lives of the characters on the show.

What is a main takeaway that you would like readers to know about wellness counseling?

Readers should know that wellness counseling is an approach that can be of value to and incorporated with most any client. It is useful regardless of the type or severity of the client’s presenting concern. It can be helpful when working with children or older adults.

The challenge is to not fall into the trap of a singular view of the client. It takes effort for the counselor to delve into the various aspects of the client’s well-being. Clients might initially balk at the idea of these different components of self. But this discomfort can result in benefit to the client.

Wellness counseling is versatile because the counselor can incorporate counseling theories that are most helpful to the client while remaining within the wellness framework. Wellness counseling is client-centered [because] you are offering the client new ways of understanding and experiencing themselves and new avenues for goal achievement.

Would you say that wellness is a new concept in the counseling profession? How long has it been something that counselors have adopted?

Wellness has been at the core of the counseling profession throughout its history. Most counselors tend to view their clients holistically and from a developmental perspective. Melvin Witmer, Thomas Sweeney and Jane Myers developed more defined theoretical and empirical wellness models for counselors in the early 1990s and 2000s. Their models are still widely used for client assessment, conceptualization and treatment planning.

A newer trend related to wellness is the integration of behavioral health with primary care. Counselors are becoming more aware of the strong relationship between physical health and mental health. Counselors are now more likely to be part of an interdisciplinary treatment team through which physical health and mental health services are integrated and coordinated together more strategically. This model fits well with a wellness perspective because counselors can engage in interdisciplinary collaboration with other professionals to provide interventions that address the client’s holistic functioning.

Are there any misconceptions or misunderstandings about wellness counseling that you’d like to clear up?

The exciting thing, in our experience, is that wellness appears to be critical to the identity of most counselors we have encountered. However, we have noticed that some counselors use aspects of wellness counseling without full intentionality or struggle to describe wellness counseling.

Thankfully, counselor educators such as Jane Myers and Thomas Sweeney have developed this information. We hope to highlight and add to their work, providing counselors with skills specific to this intervention and guidelines for determining whether or not they are working within a wellness counseling approach.

What inspired you to collaborate and create this book? Why is it relevant and needed now?

This book came together because the three of us have had many conversations about the ways that we teach wellness counseling (both as stand-alone courses and as a component of other core counseling courses) and the need for a text that delves deeply into what a wellness-based counseling approach is conceptually and also what it looks like in practice.

We wanted to write a book that is grounded in theoretical and empirical support and also provides techniques for client assessment, case conceptualization, treatment planning and intervention.

We wholeheartedly believe that wellness is an inextricable part of our professional identities as counselors and [that it] should serve as a framework for a holistic, prevention-focused approach to clients across the life span.

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Wellness Counseling: A Holistic Approach to Prevention and Intervention is available both in print and as an e-book from the American Counseling Association bookstore at counseling.org/store or by calling 800-347-6647 ext. 222.

Hear more on this topic in a session with the co-authors at the ACA Conference & Expo in New Orleans later this month. Ohrt, Clarke and Conley will present a session on wellness counseling Friday, March 29 at 4 p.m. Find out more at counseling.org/conference

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Bethany Bray is a staff writer and social media coordinator for Counseling Today. Contact her at bbray@counseling.org.

Follow Counseling Today on Twitter @ACA_CTonline and Facebook at facebook.com/CounselingToday.

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Opinions expressed and statements made in articles appearing on CT Online should not be assumed to represent the opinions of the editors or policies of the American Counseling Association.

Team sports vs. solo exercise: Which is better for your mental health?

By Bethany Bray December 3, 2018

Professional counselors often recommend exercise to clients as a way to improve mood and overall wellness. In addition to boosting serotonin, a neurotransmitter connected to feelings of well-being, exercise offers the chance to unplug from the busyness of daily life and process one’s thoughts.

A recent journal study in The Lancet Psychiatry takes that recommendation one step further, connecting team sports to improved mental health. A cohort of researchers studied four years of recent survey data from more than 1 million American adults.

They found that individuals who exercised experienced 43 percent fewer days of poor mental health in a one-month period than did people who didn’t exercise at all. Individuals who experienced the greatest mental health benefits, however, were those who participated in team sports, followed by those who rode bicycles or did aerobic and gym activities (in durations of 45 minutes, three to five times weekly).

Jude and Julius Austin, American Counseling Association members who played soccer both in college and at the professional level, stress that the study’s correlational findings do not mean causation.

“We think further research needs to be done regarding the lived experience of athletes in team sports who struggle with mental health issues,” said the brothers in a co-written statement to Counseling Today on the Lancet findings.

Although mental health improvements are not caused by exercise, physical activity does, when done appropriately, have biological, cognitive and social benefits — which Jude, an assistant professor in the counseling program at the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor in Texas, and Julius, an assistant professor in the marriage and family therapy and counseling studies program at the University of Louisiana Monroe, say they experienced as soccer players.

“It is exciting to see [researchers] investigating things we believe most athletes can collectively, albeit anecdotally, agree on,” wrote Jude, a licensed professional counselor in residency and Julius, a provisionally licensed professional counselor. “In our experience playing team sports, it feels great to survive a particularly tough practice. Pushing ourselves through seemingly impossible physical tasks with others reinforced that we have everything we need to handle life’s challenges. There is something healing about being swept away by the team’s mentality during a game; pressing or absorbing pressure, counterattacking or keeping possession, the ebb and flow of defense to offense, being in the zone. Even if it’s only for a moment, those sweeping moments were where we received social support, affirmation, genuineness, empathy and unconditional positive regard. These are all therapists’ offered conditions in an effective therapeutic relationship. We could not say this with empirical certainty, but we would imagine that receiving these conditions from a team can cause lessening of mental health issues.”

ACA member Sarah Fichtner, a former Division I women’s soccer player for the University of Maryland (UMD), has mixed feelings about the Lancet study. While there is little doubt that exercise in general benefits both mental and physical health, it can be taken to the extreme when sports are played at a high level, she says.

“I am a firm believer that exercise improves an individual’s mental health, as it produces feel-good endorphins and releases chemicals such as norepinephrine which alleviate stress and anxiety,” Fichtner says. “As an exercise and health enthusiast myself, there is not a doubt in my mind that exercise has many positive implications. However, I am a bit skeptical of the [Lancet] findings pertaining to team sports. I do see the benefits of exercise groups [in] that they provide accountability, comradery and support, but in terms of competitive team sports — particularly at the collegiate level — the environment is extremely different.”

Fichtner is a counselor intern at Hackensack Meridian Behavioral Health and is working on completing a master’s degree in clinical mental health counseling at Kean University in New Jersey. After her experience as a DI athlete, she calls for balance when it comes to competition and team sports.

“During my time as a student-athlete and captain at the University of Maryland, I saw firsthand the detrimental consequences of the collegiate world. When a player is recruited to play at the DI level, he or she is expected to perform. Coaches have one goal in mind, and that is to win,” she explains. “Practices are intense, to say the least, and the idea of healthy competition goes out the window. A player is competing against his or her teammates every day to secure a starting position. They are competing to be the fastest, fittest, slimmest and most technical or tactical player. And every day, their coaches are telling them, ‘You are not good enough,’ ‘You need to lose five more pounds to be in the running for a starting position,’ ‘Your teammates are working harder than you’ and ‘Ask your teammate so-and-so for help. She is outperforming you. She has great skills.’ This high-intensity environment can lead to many mental health challenges such as eating disorders, anxiety, depression and low self-esteem, which I witnessed during my four years at UMD. Thus, when I think about team sports, specifically at the collegiate level, the word balance comes to mind.”

“Aside from the intense environment, there were many positives takeaways from my time as a student-athlete,” Fichtner adds. “I made lifelong friendships, competed at the highest level of collegiate sports, was privileged to visit many states, had top-notch gear, learned important life lessons and would do it all over again in a heartbeat. Nevertheless, now as a mental health counselor, I see the collegiate world through a different lens. Many of the challenges we athletes faced on a daily basis seemed both normal and absolute. But now as I grow both personally and professionally, I realize that colleges need to establish a balance between a healthy competitive environment, where athletes are pushed and held accountable, and a debilitating, harmful environment, in which athletes are placed in harm’s way [of] mental health challenges. Balance is key to any exercise regimen, especially in the collegiate world.”

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Read the Lancet study in full: thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(18)30227-X/fulltext#seccestitle10

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ACA members: Interested in exploring connections between sports and mental health? Join ACA’s Sports Counseling Interest Network.

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Bethany Bray is a staff writer and social media coordinator for Counseling Today. Contact her at bbray@counseling.org.

Follow Counseling Today on Twitter @ACA_CTonline and on Facebook at facebook.com/CounselingToday.

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Opinions expressed and statements made in articles appearing on CT Online should not be assumed to represent the opinions of the editors or policies of the American Counseling Association.

Finding balance with bipolar disorder

By Laurie Meyers April 24, 2018

Licensed professional counselor (LPC) John Duggan didn’t plan on bipolar disorder becoming one of his specialties, but providing emergency room support gave him a close-up view of the consequences when the disease was left uncontrolled. Duggan, who is also a licensed clinical professional counselor (LCPC), noticed the escalation in manic and hypomanic crises that accompanied the increased light and time change in spring. He also saw people who had been diagnosed with depression but whose manic or hypomanic symptoms had gone undetected until they ended up in the emergency room with full-blown mania, psychosis or dysphoria.

Some of these individuals had no one to help them remain stabilized after leaving the hospital. Seeing the need for, as Duggan puts it, “boots on the ground,” he began seeing more and more clients with bipolar disorder in his private practice in Silver Spring, Maryland. Duggan, who is now the manager of professional development at the American Counseling Association, says some of those clients came as referrals from counselors who didn’t feel qualified to work with individuals struggling with bipolar disorder.

It is not uncommon for counselors to be hesitant to take on clients with a bipolar diagnosis, according to practitioners who specialize in the disorder. At the same time, there are many individuals with bipolar disorder who truly need the support of counselors and other mental health professionals to help them manage their condition. Although the public — and perhaps even some mental health professionals — may think that the disease is rare, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) estimates that approximately 2.8 percent of U.S. adults currently have bipolar disorder and that 4.4 percent will experience it in their lifetime. NIMH also estimates that approximately 2.9 percent of adolescents currently have bipolar disorder.

Some mental health practitioners may buy in to the stereotype that clients with bipolar disorder are volatile and resistant to treatment, whereas others may be daunted by the disorder’s elevated risk of suicide. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration estimates that for those with bipolar disorder, the lifetime risk of suicide is at least 15 times higher than it is for the average person. However, Duggan and others who treat bipolar disorder say that counselors have a crucial role to play in helping clients manage the disease.

Bipolar basics

Counselors are already trained to obtain a detailed client history that includes, among other things, emotional symptoms, family history and sleep and lifestyle habits, all of which can be crucial to spotting bipolar disorder.

“Bipolar clients often seek help only when depressed. Because of this, their manic or hypomanic symptoms are often not reported or observed,” explains Valerie Acosta, an LPC who counsels a number of clients with bipolar disorder in her Richmond, Virginia, practice.

A first step is for counselors to educate clients. Although they may be familiar with the symptoms of depression, they are much less likely to know how mania or hypomania present, adds Acosta, a member of ACA. Many clients think mania involves feeling very “up” and happy, but symptoms actually include intense irritability, anxiety and distraction, she explains.

Sleep patterns are also instructive when looking for evidence of mania or hypomania, says Regina Bordieri, a licensed marriage and family therapist in New York who specializes in bipolar disorder. “If they’re not sleeping, are they feeling energetic or tired?” she asks. Most people feel tired after a short night’s rest, but in hypomanic or manic phases, those with bipolar disorder feel energized despite very little sleep, Bordieri explains.Bordieri also asks clients about times when they weren’t depressed. Did they have high levels of energy and feel like they could get a lot done? Depressed moods that alternate with periods of intense activity and feelings of almost limitless energy may be signs of bipolar disorder.

Because it can be difficult for individuals to recognize their mood and behavioral shifts, family members and partners can also play a significant role when it comes to identifying and gauging symptoms, Bordieri says. Then, of course, there is the other role that family plays in diagnosis — namely, family history. Bipolar disorder is strongly tied to genetics, so clients with a family history of bipolar disorder are more likely to develop the disease.

Duggan urges counselors who are treating clients with bipolar disorder to work closely with medical professionals. Consulting a client’s primary care physician (with the client’s permission) is particularly crucial during diagnosis so that physical causes such as sleep disorders, thyroid disorders or a reaction to medication won’t be mistaken as symptoms for bipolar disorder.

Counselors — and clients — should also be aware of their ideas concerning which symptoms and forms of bipolar disorder are most debilitating, say Acosta and Bordieri.

“Bipolar II is not a milder form of bipolar I, but a separate and different diagnosis,” Acosta explains. “Bipolar I is also not necessarily more difficult to treat. … While the manic episodes in bipolar I can be severe and dangerous, the depressive episodes associated with bipolar II can be longer lasting, causing severe impairment to the individual. While clients with bipolar II have hypomania and not full manic episodes, their depressive episodes can be more debilitating than the depressive episodes of bipolar I.”

Although the depression of bipolar II may take a greater overall toll and be harder to treat, the mania inherent in bipolar I comes with its own set of “baggage.” In the popular imagination, mania — especially more extreme episodes — is the phase most associated with bipolar disorder and contributes to the perception that those who have the disorder are “crazy.” Mania is also extremely disturbing for clients and is highly stigmatized, especially when it leads to hospital stays, Bordieri says.

Ultimately, however, each client’s experience of bipolar disorder is different, Acosta says. “A therapist might be working with two people with bipolar II, and these individuals may present with very different symptoms,” she says. “Helping clients and their families to understand the individual’s unique symptoms, and have a variety of tools and strategies for managing their moods and specific symptoms, is essential for recovery.”

Managing medication

The counselors interviewed for this article stress that because of the neurobiological nature of bipolar disorder, medication is an integral part of treatment. Cheryl Fisher, an LCPC practicing in Annapolis, Maryland, whose specialties include bipolar disorder, says that counselors should work closely with a psychiatrist when treating these clients. In fact, when Fisher sees new clients with bipolar disorder who are working with a primary care physician, she strongly urges them to begin seeing a psychiatrist. Fisher, a member of ACA, believes that psychiatrists possess the specialized psychopharmaceutical knowledge necessary for prescribing the medication “cocktail” that works best for each individual with bipolar disorder. And because counselors see clients more often (and for longer chunks of time) than their physicians do, Fisher thinks that counselors are in a better position to track the effectiveness and side effects of clients’ prescriptions.

Counselors can also help clients become better self-advocates, says ACA member Dixie Meyer. Sometimes clients aren’t comfortable speaking up at the doctor’s office or are unaware that they are even experiencing side effects, she says. Counselors are in a position to spot such problems.

Meyer gives the example of a client who was showing signs of lithium toxicity. “I asked him when was the last time he had his blood levels checked [lithium requires regular blood testing to guard against toxicity]. He asked me what I was talking about. Somehow, he never knew he needed to have levels checked regularly.”

Meyer, an associate professor in the medical family therapy program at the St. Louis University School of Medicine’s Relationships and Brain Science Research Laboratory, says counselors should also be aware that clients with bipolar disorder might be given antidepressants for depression that can cause the onset of mania or hypomania.

“Clients might feel like, ‘Wow, I’m really starting to have a good mood,’” she notes. “They don’t really think to bring that up to the doctor, but the counselor can easily recognize the difference between remission of depression symptoms versus the development of manic symptoms. [Clients] might become more impulsive, snippier, their motor behavior more agitated … Counselors and family members are often the best [resources] to spot mood shifts.”

Sometimes clients don’t want to take medication for bipolar disorder because they have experienced unpleasant side effects, says Meyer, who frequently gives presentations to counselors on the importance of understanding their clients’ medications. She urges counselors to talk through this decision with clients. Meyer informs her clients with bipolar disorder that all medications have side effects, some of which may be temporary. She then asks these clients to give the medications some time and encourages them to talk to their physicians about which side effects might be permanent.

If the side effects of the medication aren’t going to go away, Meyer talks with clients about whether the side effects are something they can live with. In some cases — especially with medications that cause significant weight gain — the client’s answer is no. In those situations, Meyer says that she, the client and the physician go back to the drawing board and look for other medications or explore whether lifestyle changes might help reduce the side effects.

Meyer says all counselors should have a copy of the Physicians’ Desk Reference on hand so that they can quickly look up any medication. She also recommends Drugs.com as an excellent online resource.

Sometimes clients with bipolar disorder get stabilized and decide that they don’t need to take their medications anymore. When that happens, Acosta says that she “reflects back” what happened the last time the client stopped taking his or her medication. (Spoiler alert: It wasn’t good.)

Fisher tries to educate clients about bipolar disorder, emphasizing that a biochemical reaction underlies their mood shifts and that the medication helps buffer that process.

Medication, however, is not the only tool in the box to help individuals with bipolar disorder. Counselors can provide the emotional and lifestyle keys that help clients manage and, hopefully, decrease their mood and behavior shifts.

Prevention and stabilization

Multiple research studies continue to demonstrate the link between the circadian rhythm and bipolar disorder. Researchers are still teasing out the specifics, but what is clear is that maintaining a schedule — particularly a sleep schedule — that hews to the circadian rhythm plays a key role in controlling the disease.

Research has shown that insomnia is not just a symptom of depression but can also cause it. Likewise, Bordieri says, disturbed sleep can be either a symptom of hypomania/mania or the trigger for an episode.

Sleep is one of the first things that Fisher investigates with all clients, but it is particularly important in those with bipolar disorder. “I ask them what their sleep routine is,” she says. “How do you end your day? How do you prepare your body to rest? What is your sleeping environment like?” Fisher talks about how the blue light from devices such as smartphones and tablets disrupts sleep and advises clients to establish total darkness in their bedrooms.

Some clients reveal that a racing brain regularly prevents them from going to sleep. For these clients, Fisher recommends tools such as guided meditation or performing what she calls a “brain dump” — emptying the mind by writing down all of the thoughts that are keeping clients awake.

Acosta encourages clients with bipolar disorder to go to bed at the same time every night, wake up at the same time every day and take their medications at the same time daily. She has found this routine has a stabilizing effect.

Fisher and Duggan both believe sleep is so essential to mental and physical health that if good sleep hygiene isn’t working, they advise clients to get a sleep aid from their physician.

Duggan has found that the changing of the seasons can also have a profound effect on bipolar disorder. It’s a component of the bipolar resiliency program he came up with called SMART.

S — (Control) stress, sleep, maintain a schedule, seasons: Duggan asks clients with bipolar disorder to track their moods and sleep. He also teaches sleep hygiene and makes note of clients’ responses to the different seasons. Summer, when there is a lot of activity going on and plenty of sun, is usually a good time for many clients with bipolar disorder. But as the season draws to a close, Duggan reminds them that once fall arrives and there is less light, they are likely to start feeling less upbeat and may feel overwhelmed. He urges these clients not to overschedule themselves in summer and to step up their self-care efforts when the calendar turns to September.

M — Medication as prescribed

A — Adjunctive treatment such as yoga, acupuncture, massage or other complementary or alternative practices: Duggan says these are all areas that are outside of his expertise but that clients have found helpful. He also works with clients on self-soothing techniques and meditation. If a client is going through a severe manic or depressive phase, however, he strongly recommends against mindfulness. “I don’t want them to ‘be’ with the bad depression or the bad mania,” he explains.

R — Recreation and relationships: Duggan urges clients with bipolar disorder to stay engaged socially and to “do things that bring you joy, that you love, that give you a sense of flow.”

T — Therapy and counseling as needed

Fisher is a proponent of what she calls “nature therapy.” Research has shown that nature has a beneficial effect on mental health, so she urges clients to find a way to get outside — even if only for a short time — every day.

“Encouraging clients to track their moods can be a very valuable tool,” Acosta adds. “There are a wide variety of apps that clients can download to help with tracking their moods. Daylio is one that a lot of my clients like to use. By recording this information over time, clients learn about how their moods cycle, and this helps them to better understand the nuances of their moods, their triggers, and what helps and does not help with stabilizing their moods. I routinely review data from these apps — or paper mood charts — with my clients. I also routinely review symptom charts with my clients to help them monitor their symptoms.”

Some of Acosta’s clients have also had their own highly personal methods of tracking problematic mood changes. One client monitored her mood elevations by the number of packages that appeared for her in her apartment lobby (overspending). Another client could connect his manic symptoms to times when he would spend several days engrossed in building things (an increased focus on goal-directed activities).

Developing this degree of self-awareness can be beneficial for clients with bipolar disorder. “Linking symptoms to behaviors, thoughts and triggers can help to foster recovery,” Acosta says.

Meyer also teaches clients to spot patterns. She has premenopausal women chart their menstrual cycles so they will be aware, for example, that three days before their periods begin, they will feel more depressed. Meyer instructs clients to note their moods throughout the day and record what was going on. She believes that when clients can identify these patterns and recognize that there was a specific reason they were particularly manic or depressed, it provides them a greater sense of control.

Meyer teaches clients to self-soothe on hard days by going for a walk, going to the park and sitting on a bench or doing whatever else makes them feel good in a healthy way.

“It’s really important … that our clients be empowered with a strategy for their symptoms,” Fisher says. For instance, if clients with bipolar disorder are having a down day and feel as though they are shifting toward a depressive episode, they could start to manage the switch by making a plan to get together with a friend or even just calling someone close to them.

Acosta tries to equip clients with bipolar disorder against life stressors. “They need to find healthy ways to cope with stress,” she says.

Acosta teaches clients mindfulness meditation and gives assignments outside of session, such as trying yoga or a new form of exercise. She believes that physical activity helps rein in racing thoughts. Acosta also recommends music for relaxation.

Seeking support

In addition to individual therapy, Acosta has found that group therapy is very effective for clients with bipolar disorder. She runs a monthly support group for adults over 18. “Some participants have been living with bipolar disorder for decades, and some have just been diagnosed,” Acosta says. “This is an open group, so members are constantly joining and leaving the group. On average, we have three to 10 participants per group. Because this is a therapy group, participants bring in and discuss any issue that they’re currently dealing with in their lives. Some of the topics of discussion include challenges such as the struggle to be on time for work or losing a job because of their bipolar symptoms, relationship conflicts, the side effects of medication, healthy strategies for managing symptoms, grieving the losses in their lives caused by their illness and building healthy living strategies.”

Acosta also provides education as needed in the group on topics such as understanding symptoms, exploring apps to track mood and locating resources for further education and support. She believes the peer support is what is most helpful to group participants.

“Many people have never met someone else with bipolar disorder, and learning that they are not alone or the only person dealing with the challenges of bipolar disorder can be extremely comforting and helpful,” she says. “Seeing peers recover, build healthy relationships and obtain their goals and dreams is most powerful.”

Support for these clients is essential, agrees Meyer, who recommends that counselors help recruit family members and romantic partners as a kind of support team whenever possible. Loved ones can be there when counselors can’t and are often the first to spot mood changes, she explains. “We also know when clients are in good, healthy relationships, it helps stress levels, and that helps keep them in good health,” Meyer adds.

Sometimes support can come from the strangest of sources, notes Fisher, relating the story of a woman who was in particular need of connection. “I had a client who had a trauma history in addition to bipolar disorder, and she was engaging in really unhealthy behaviors and self-loathing. She was just not in good shape,” Fisher says. “She came in one day, I did a checkup, and she showed really high levels of depression.”

Fisher didn’t think the client was in immediate danger, but she felt bad leaving her without another source of support, particularly because it was a Friday and Fisher was going away for the weekend.

“I asked, ‘Who can you be with? Who can you talk to?’’ Fisher says. “The client said, ‘No one. There is no one.’”

The woman was estranged from her family, and her only “network” involved her sexual hookups.

Suddenly, Fisher had an idea. She had just bought a betta fish for her office, so she asked the client to watch it for her over the weekend.

Fisher saw the client the following Monday — sans fish — and asked how she was doing. The client replied that she was feeling better and more upbeat.

“Then she started talking about her weekend and spending time with ‘Olive’ and watching TV with ‘Olive,’” Fisher continues.

She asked the client who Olive was. Olive was the name the client had bestowed on the betta fish. The client had neglected to bring Olive back because she didn’t want to leave the fish in the car but promised to return her later in the week.

Fisher told the woman to keep the fish but was curious as to why she had named her Olive. The client said that Olive made her think of hope — like the olive leaf the dove brought back to Noah’s Ark to show the waters were finally receding after the Great Flood described in the Bible.

What lesson did Fisher take away from this experience? “We have to get our clients to connect — even if it’s just with a betta fish,” she says.

Fisher urges counselors to overcome any reservations they might harbor about treating clients with bipolar disorder. “Get more training if you’re uncomfortable,” says Fisher, who encourages counselors to ask themselves why they might be uncomfortable and then to address those reasons.

Counselors already possess the skills needed to empower these clients, Fisher adds. “We have clients who are walking in the door with this diagnosis and identifying it with who they are,” she says. “Bipolar disorder is not who they are — their diagnosis is not their identity. People think, ‘My body is betraying me. I feel like crap. I’ve alienated all my friends — I am the monster.’ Counselors can exorcise the demon of the [bipolar] diagnosis.”

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Additional resources

To learn more about the topics discussed in this article, take advantage of the following select resources offered by the American Counseling Association:

Counseling Today (ct.counseling.org)

“Healthy conversations to have” by Kathleen Smith
“A light in the darkness” by Bethany Bray
“Client, counselor, prescriber” by Lynne Shallcross
“Tossing and turning in the digital age” by Laurie Meyers

Books (counseling.org/publications/bookstore)

Assessment in Counseling: Procedures and Practices, sixth edition, by Danica G. Hays
Cognitive Behavior Therapies: A Guidebook for Practitioners edited by Ann Vernon and Kristene A. Doyle

Podcasts and webinars

“Bipolar Resiliency Program” with John Duggan (HT056)
“Depression/Bipolar” with Carman S. Gill

Practice briefs (counseling.org/knowledge-center/practice-briefs)

“Counseling Adults Who Have Bipolar Disorders” by Victoria Kress, Stephanie Sedall and Matthew Paylo

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Laurie Meyers is the senior writer for Counseling Today. Contact her at lmeyers@counseling.org.

Letters to the editor:ct@counseling.org

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Opinions expressed and statements made in articles appearing on CT Online should not be assumed to represent the opinions of the editors or policies of the American Counseling Association.

The counselor’s role in assessing and treating medical symptoms and diagnoses

By Jori A. Berger-Greenstein April 4, 2018

Take a moment to imagine the following scene, with you as the protagonist: A few days ago, you woke, went for a run, had breakfast and headed to work, where you attended a committee meeting. The next thing you remember is lying in a hospital bed and being told that you had a stroke. You seem unable to move or feel one of your legs.

You are in a double room with an elderly man who has had many relatives and friends visit, although he seems not to be doing well. You’re not sure, however, because you feel foggy. Is this a side effect of the medication they keep giving you?

You are dressed in a hospital johnny and confined to bed. A nurse checks your vital signs on the hour, often waking you when you’re sleeping. An intravenous tube in your arm is connected to a bag with some sort of liquid in it, and you are hooked up to monitors, although you’re uncertain of what they are monitoring. Beepers sound regularly, prompting the nurses to come check you, look at the monitors or change out the bag.

A doctor visits in the mornings, along with a group of medical students, reminding you of Grey’s Anatomy, complete with looks back and forth and eye-rolling. They talk among themselves as if you aren’t there, using medical jargon that you don’t understand. Your family members are anxious and tearful. You hear them talking to the doctor about transferring you to another facility because your insurance won’t continue to cover your stay in the hospital. You also hear your spouse on the phone with relatives who live across the country but want to come see you.

As the patient, how might you be feeling? What might you be thinking?

Now imagine that instead of being the patient, you are a mental health provider called in to assess the patient for depression. How might you respond?

The above scenario and others similar to it are commonplace for many providers who operate in the field of behavioral medicine, which the Society of Behavioral Medicine defines as the “interdisciplinary field concerned with the development and integration of behavioral, psychosocial and biomedical science knowledge and techniques relevant to the understanding of health and illness, and the application of this knowledge and these techniques to prevention, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation.”

As recognition of the psychological and behavioral factors involved in medical illness has increased, so has our ability as mental health counselors to serve a valuable function in patient care. Providers and researchers alike now recognize the importance of approaching health care more holistically rather than compartmentalizing medical versus psychological well-being.

Understanding context

Primary care providers, the first stop for most people’s health-related complaints, operate under ever-increasing pressures to provide care for more people in less time. The average visit lasts 10 to 15 minutes, with the goal of assessing presenting symptoms (typically while simultaneously entering patient information into a computer system) to ascertain their cause and thereby provide information about how to treat them. There often isn’t time to gather the context of these symptoms, increasing the likelihood that important details can be missed. Likewise, there isn’t sufficient time to fully discuss the pros and cons of treatment options, the potential barriers to treatment and whether a patient is willing or able to follow through on the treatment recommendations.

In contrast, mental health providers often have the luxury of coming to understand patients/clients more fully. This includes understanding and appreciating the contexts in which patients/clients find themselves, understanding how these individuals are coping and making meaning of what is happening, and forming a trusting relationship with them, which is consistently demonstrated to be predictive of adherence to care and improvements in health-related parameters.

As Thomas Sequist, assistant professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School, stated in a New York Times article in 2008, “It isn’t that [medical] providers are doing different things for different patients, it’s that we’re doing the same thing for every patient and not accounting for individual needs.”

It can be said that medical providers are trained to identify and treat symptoms in order to identify disease so that a patient can be effectively treated — which is, in fact, their role. In contrast, mental health providers are trained to treat people and illness — illness being one’s experience of disease rather than just a compilation of symptoms or diagnostic labels.

The process of assessing for mental health symptoms

A variety of mental health conditions are characterized by symptoms that overlap with those attributable to medical conditions. For example, symptoms of an overactive or underactive thyroid mimic anxiety and depression, respectively. Psychosis can mimic neurological conditions, mood disorders can mimic endocrine disease, anxiety can mimic cardiac dysfunction and so on.

Through training mental health clinicians to identify symptoms that may indicate a medical cause and knowing how to assess for the possibility of a medical workup, we can make earlier referrals for medical care. This, in turn, helps us to identify diagnoses more quickly, leading to easier/more efficacious treatment and better validating concerns.

One’s cultural identity and the resonance of cultural norms are also important to assess and monitor. For instance, a patient may be reluctant to engage with an English-speaking provider, may have a vastly different conceptualization of illness as punishment (in stark contrast to the Westernized biopsychosocial model) and may need validation for his or her reliance on faith and spirituality.

Collaboration

Collaborating as mental health clinicians directly with medical professionals toward the common goal of helping those who need our care can be invaluable. Examples include ruling out mental health disorders, identifying appropriate treatments in the case of comorbidities, providing emotional support to patients who have been diagnosed with a medical disorder and supporting physicians who may be overwhelmed. For instance, medical treaters may not know or understand the presentation of symptoms associated with trauma or the intricacies of providing trauma-informed care.

Being knowledgeable as mental health clinicians about medical-related symptoms, the language and jargon of medicine, and strategies for navigating the medical system provides us with critical credibility. This credibility can make or break our ability to collaborate as mental health clinicians.

Providing care

At its best, behavioral medicine functions as a prevention-focused model with three levels of care:

1) Primary prevention refers to preventing a problem from emerging to begin with. Examples of this might be establishing obesity prevention programs in public schools for young children or working with high-risk families to promote safety practices. The idea is to work with groups that may be more vulnerable to risks at some point in the future and to prevent those outcomes from occurring.

2) Secondary prevention involves working with people who have developed a problem of some sort, with the goal of preventing it from worsening or becoming a larger problem. Examples include working with people who are prehypertensive in order to prevent hypertension and subsequent cardiovascular disease or stroke, and working with people with HIV to increase their adherence to antiretroviral medication to reduce viral load, making them less infectious to others and providing them with more healthy years of life.

3) Tertiary prevention refers to helping people manage an already-existing disease. This might involve increasing quality of life for people enduring a condition that won’t improve, such as a spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis or late-stage renal disease, and supporting people in the later stages of a disease that is imminently terminal.

Transtheoretical model (stages of change)

Although mental health clinicians may be familiar with efficacious interventions for a given condition, we may not be perceived as credible if we do not understand and respect the client’s/patient’s motivation. No mental health provider’s repertoire is complete without an understanding of the transtheoretical model and how to utilize it to increase an individual’s motivation for positive change.

Assessing where a client/patient might be in the stages of this model (precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance) helps us to better target our interventions in a respectful way by taking context into consideration. Clients/patients in the precontemplation stage might benefit most from education and are less likely to be receptive to recommendations for lifestyle changes, whereas those in the action stage may not need as much of an emphasis on motivation. For a thorough description of the transtheoretical model, I would refer readers to William Miller and Stephen Rollnick’s seminal work, Motivational Interviewing: Helping People Change.

Concrete needs and specific skills

The majority of causes of death and disability in the United States are those caused or treated, at least in part, by behavior. Nationally, the top 10 causes of death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2015), include cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease, cancer, pulmonary disease, unintentional injuries, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and suicide. Changes in lifestyle, knowledge/education and interpersonal support can be successfully utilized as part of all three levels of prevention. In fact, these are areas in which mental health providers can be extremely valuable.

Primary prevention: Data suggest that the single most preventable cause of death is tobacco use, which can dramatically increase the risk of developing cancer, pulmonary disease and cardiovascular disease. Comprehensive smoking-cessation programs can be quite effective in managing this, as can education to prevent young people from initiating cigarette use.

Sedentary behavior (and, to a lesser extent, lack of exercise) is also strongly associated with health problems, perhaps most commonly cardiovascular disease and cancer. Concrete strategies for introducing nonsedentary behaviors (using the stairs, standing up once an hour, walking) can be incorporated into one’s lifestyle with less effort than a complex exercise regimen.

Getting proper nutrition, practicing good dental hygiene and consistently wearing sunscreen, helmets and seat belts are other examples of primary prevention in behavioral medicine. Motivating people who have not (yet) experienced the negative consequences of their risk behaviors is an approach that mental health providers are trained to provide.

Secondary prevention: The rates of obesity have risen dramatically in the past decade and are associated with a wide variety of serious medical complications, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke and cancer. If treated effectively, the risk of such complications can be reduced significantly. Examples of interventions found to be useful include aerobic exercise, dietary change (such as adhering to a Mediterranean diet and managing portions) and monitoring weight loss.

Although the specifics of these interventions may be most appropriately prescribed by dietitians and physical therapists, mental health providers can add value by helping to increase clients’/patients’ motivation and adherence, providing more thorough education about recommendations and collaborating with other providers.

Tertiary prevention: Spinal cord injury, most often caused by motor vehicle accidents, falls or violence, can have a devastating effect on a person’s life. These injuries are not reversible, but mental health providers can prove valuable in tertiary prevention efforts. These efforts might involve providing existential support; helping patients to navigate the medical system and ask for/receive support from significant others; and identifying strategies for improving quality of life and accessing tangible resources to sustain some aspects of independence.

Getting started

So, how might clinical mental health counselors “break into” the system? The ideal is an integrated care model in which mental health providers are colocated within the medical setting. This serves a dual function of facilitating mental health referrals and making it easier for patients/clients to see us because we’re just down the hall or up a flight of stairs from the medical providers. It also ensures that we remain visible to medical providers and allows for us to easily demonstrate our value.

Short of this, and for those who are less interested in focused work in behavioral medicine, the following suggestions may be helpful:

1) Attend trainings. This is a crucial first step before mental health counselors can ethically market themselves as being knowledgeable about behavioral medicine. As an example, with rates of diabetes increasing, and associated adjustment and psychological sequelae common, learning all you can about the disease and strategies for managing it provides you with some expertise and a valuable referral option. This is consistent with current recommendations for branding a practice.

2) Develop a niche. Your services can be all the more compelling if you have developed a niche for yourself that fills a gap. Research your area and the specialties that mental health providers are marketing. Is there something missing? For instance, many providers may be offering care for people who are terminally ill, but are there providers specializing in working with young people in this situation? Are people who specialize in working with pediatric cancer also advertising services to treat siblings or affected parents?

3) Being mindful of your competence and expertise, connect with medical providers and let them know that you are accepting clients. For instance, if you work with children or adolescents, consider reaching out to pediatricians. Research consistently finds that the only linkage to care someone with mental illness may have is through his or her primary care physician. Providing these physicians with literature about your services makes it easy for them to pass along your information to anyone they think may benefit. Mental health counselors can connect with medical providers via personal visits to physicians’ offices or through direct marketing to professional organizations. Note that approaching small practices may be the better option because they are less likely to already be linked with another service (hospitals often have their own behavioral health clinics/providers).

4) Connect with specialty care providers. These providers tend to have greater need of mental health professionals who are familiar with a given diagnosis.

5) Don’t be afraid to contact a medical provider treating one of your clients. This can provide a means for collaborative care and could also serve to gain you credibility, while indicating that you are glad to take referrals. Clearly, this should be done only if clinically indicated and only with the client’s permission.

6) Finally, be prepared to describe your experience, training and competency areas in a brief fashion. In the busy world of medicine, time is quite valuable. Mental health providers’ skills in waxing poetic can get in the way of communicating the essence of what we want to get across.

Ethics

This article would be incomplete without a mention of ethics. Behavioral medicine is a field rife with ethical concerns. Perhaps the most salient of these is competence. From an ethical lens, it is critical that we, as mental health counselors, recognize the limits of our competencies — that is, we are not trained in medicine and thus cannot ethically diagnose a medical condition, recommend treatments that could be potentially harmful or assure patients/clients that medical evaluations or treatments are unnecessary. All of these actions require the input and monitoring of medical treaters, who can guide our efforts in care. Patients/clients also need to be clearly informed of both our benefits to and limitations in their care. The world of medicine changes rapidly, and the half-life of training in medicine and medical care is short. Ongoing education is critical.

Let’s return to the scenario described at the beginning of this article. The shared goal for all providers — medical, psychological and other — is to provide efficacious and meaningful care in a way that improves the patient’s health and quality of life. By utilizing our respective areas of training, competencies and strengths, we can better understand the context of symptoms, which can guide our care. This is the cornerstone of providing ethical care.

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Knowledge Share articles are developed from sessions presented at American Counseling Association conferences.

Jori A. Berger-Greenstein is an assistant professor at the Boston University School of Medicine and a faculty member in the mental health counseling and behavioral medicine program. She is an outpatient provider in adult behavioral health at Boston Medical Center, where she serves on the hospital’s clinical ethics committee. She also maintains a private practice. Contact her at jberger@bu.edu.

Letters to the editor: ct@counseling.org

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Opinions expressed and statements made in articles appearing on CT Online should not be assumed to represent the opinions of the editors or policies of the American Counseling Association.

Behind the book: Neurocounseling: Brain-Based Clinical Approaches

Compiled by Bethany Bray February 20, 2018

The influence of neuroscience on the counseling profession is growing. So much so that the American Counseling Association has an interest network of members devoted to its exploration and discussion.

Neuroscience can be both a tool — one of many — in a counselor’s toolbox and a game-changing way to conceptualize clients, conduct assessments and select interventions, write Thomas A. Field, Laura K. Jones and Lori A. Russell-Chapin in their new book Neurocounseling: Brain-Based Clinical Approaches (published by the American Counseling Association).

“Neuroscience can help counselors understand how relationships are forged, leading to deeper and more meaningful working relationships with clients; recognize the persisting impact of systemic barriers such as oppression, marginalization and trauma on clients’ ability to achieve their goals; and take a wellness and strengths-based perspective that serves to empower clients and increase optimal performance,” they write in the book’s preface. “In other words, neurocounseling is commensurate with the orientation and identity of the counseling profession.”

Field is an associate professor in the master’s counseling program at the City University of Seattle; Jones is an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Asheville; and Russell-Chapin is professor of counselor education at Bradley University in Illinois. Counseling Today sent the trio some questions, via email, to learn more.

Q+A: Neurocounseling

(Responses written individually as indicated; some responses have been edited, including for length)

Besides your book, what resources do you recommend for counselors who want to learn more about neurocounseling?

Lori Russell-Chapin: We are learning more about the fascinating brain every day through research and brain scanning. Counselors need to know as much as possible about the brain, especially as it relates to the skills of counseling. The very first thing helping professionals can do is refresh their knowledge base and skills. Take a course or workshop on neurocounseling. That material is out there. At Bradley University, there is an online course called “Neurocounseling: Bridging Brain and Behavior.” Perhaps readers might have a desire to even take an introductory course on human anatomy and physiology. Almost any university will offer this course. Even if you took a similar course years ago, take a new one. So much has changed in the last decade. Attend any ACA Conference and participate in the many workshops scheduled on neurocounseling. The number has tripled in the last 10 years.

Decide what aspect of neurocounseling interests you, [and] then ask colleagues for potential courses to take, from heart rate variability to biofeedback or neurofeedback. Many excellent for-profit corporations are offering these biofeedback and neurofeedback courses.

Of course, join any of the professional networks that have been created to connect with others who have similar interests: ACA Neurocounseling Interest Network; AMHCA (American Mental Health Counselors Association) Neuroscience Interest Network and ACES (Association for Counselor Education and Supervision) Neuroscience Interest Network. At the ACA conferences, these three groups join forces to connect and share information.

In the preface, you write that neurocounseling is “commensurate with the orientation and identity of the counseling profession.” Can you elaborate? How do you feel neuroscience is a good fit for professional counseling? How are counselors particularly suited to adopt its principles into their work?

Thom Field: Counseling has been defined as “a professional relationship that empowers diverse individuals, families, and groups to accomplish mental health, wellness, education and career goals.”

Neuroscience supports and strengthens the counseling profession’s values, as reflected in the above definition:

1) The relationship takes precedence.

2) Diversity is affirmed and actions are taken to modify the societal conditions and environments that cause dysfunction.

3) Wellness and mental health are as much a focus of intervention as remediating psychopathology.

4) A person’s strengths and challenges are conceptualized within the developmental context in which they occur.

First, neuroscience has and can provide information to us about what conditions are most important for a therapeutic relationship to be established. Information about client neurophysiological responses in the counseling room can help us understand what helping behaviors are facilitative, such as establishing safety and security. Chapter 5 of our book, written by Allen Ivey, Thomas Daniels, Carlos Zalaquett and Mary Bradford Ivey, is instructive in this regard. While theories of effective relational characteristics exist (e.g., interpersonal neurobiology, polyvagal theory), we believe more research is needed in this regard.

Second, epigenetics provides rich information about the neurophysiological impact of systematic marginality, oppression and trauma. Kathryn Douthit’s chapter on the biology of marginality (chapter 3) and Laura Jones’ chapter on traumatic stress (chapter 4) provide an excellent overview of this topic.

Third, neurocounseling supports the importance of adequate sleep, diet, exercise, social involvement and spiritual engagement in optimal functioning. Ted Chapin’s chapter on wellness and optimal performance (chapter 8) provides an extremely helpful clinical case study that emphasizes what a wellness-oriented neurocounseling approach might look like in practice.

Fourth, neurocounseling emphasizes the importance of understanding the development of the brain and body over the life span. Laura Jones’ first two chapters emphasize how to conceptualize client issues through the lens of neurophysiological development.

Lastly, we would be remiss if we did not mention that the text was organized around the Council for Accreditation of Counseling & Related Educational Programs’ 2016 standards. We believe that principles from neuroscience are relevant and applicable to the eight common core CACREP areas (human growth and development, social and cultural foundations, helping relationships, assessment, research, group counseling, ethical practice and even career development) as well as specialization areas (e.g., psychopharmacology, addiction, etc.).

In your opinion, how far has the profession come in understanding and incorporating neuroscience into counseling practice? Is it being readily adopted, or are there counselors who misunderstand it or don’t feel that it is useful?

Laura K. Jones: There is the question of how far has the profession come in incorporating neuroscience into counseling practice, and then there is the question of how far we have come in incorporating neuroscience into the profession as a whole, which are two related but distinct questions.

With regard to the profession, interest in neuroscience has expanded significantly in the past 10 years, since Allen Ivey and Mary Bradford Ivey gave one of the first talks on brain-based counseling at ACA’s 2008 Conference & Expo in Honolulu. One example is simply the number of conference sessions that integrate a discussion of neuroscience. At the 2008 conference, there were only around five that discussed the brain in some manner; at the 2017 conference [in San Francisco], there were not only three learning institutes but 17 educational sessions. This pattern of growth is visible across every sector of the counseling field, including both clinical training and practice areas. The 2016 CACREP standards delineate an increased focus on training in the neurological foundations of client development, well-being, presenting concerns and the counseling process, with over three times the number of references to the application of neurobiology and neuroscience than were cited in the 2009 standards.

AMHCA is also strengthening its focus on neuroscience, not only expanding its training and clinical practice standards in such areas, but also now allocating a section of its flagship journal, the Journal of Mental Health Counseling, to articles detailing the integration of neuroscience into counseling research or clinical practice. There are three national neuroscience interest networks, one representing each of the core organizations (namely ACA, AMHCA and ACES), as well as a new neuroscience virtual meetup group based out of Northwestern University, BRAINSTORM, which has monthly meetings to discuss neuroscience research and translate such research into clinical implications. Each of these groups now has hundreds of members — a significant change from the two pages of handwritten names I collected at the 2013 ACES conference in Denver, which were used to start the first neuroscience interest network within the field.

And this is a trend being mirrored across all mental health professions. As research surrounding the physiological underpinnings and outcomes of mental health struggles continues to expand (the roles of inflammation, the microbiome-gut-brain axis, the endocrine system, etc.), mental health providers are being called to reexamine our conceptualizations of mental health and mental health disorders, and neurophysiology is a significant construct within this new paradigm. Occasionally I will still hear individuals refer to this shift as a “fad,” but that perspective appears to quickly be fading.

One of the cautions, however, is that while there is certainly an ever-growing interest and acceptance within the field, as is often the case with an interest that grows quickly, there is also misinformation and to some degree a misrepresentation and overextension of the science that is also occurring. This is why, from my perspective, one of the especially exciting trends I am seeing in this area within our field is the rapidly growing number of master’s- and doctoral-level students who are eager to gain training in neuroscience. This interest, and subsequently the training of these future counselors and counselor educators, is the catalyst for continued growth and research [concerning how we as a profession can integrate neuroscience into our field in a manner that honors our unique professional identity.

To continue to accurately, ethically and successfully incorporate neuroscience into the profession, we need to enhance our efforts at training counselors and counselor educators in the basic principles of neuroscience and how this information can be applied to our work with clients, supervisees and students. As such, we cannot sustain this interest within the field and our reputation in the larger mental health world without having a body of counselor educators who are accurately trained in neuroscience and able to teach future generations of practitioners and educators.

This is one of my primary interests in this movement and was a significant impetus for me in working on this book. This gets back to the original distinction I made between a growing emphasis in the field versus in clinical practice. Where we see the preponderance of the integration of neuroscience into counseling practice now is in client conceptualizations, psychoeducation, wellness practices, social justice and, to some degree, assessment. Research has also substantiated that psychotherapy has the ability to enhance brain functioning in the alleviation of client symptoms. However, additional outcome-based research is needed within the counseling field in particular to further our understanding of how we can use neuroscience to further substantiate our theories and techniques, as well as build new, more efficacious interventions.

We have made significant progress in the last 10 years, and yet we still have plenty of room to grow, as do the other mental health professions in this area. I am excited to see the continued expansion of neuroscience within our field and counselors become even more established as leaders in neurophysiologically informed research, practice and mental health policy in the future.

What misconceptions might counselors have about neurocounseling?

Laura K. Jones: There are a number of common misconceptions that individuals have when it comes to the integration of neuroscience into clinical training and practice. One of the primary misconceptions is that neurocounseling is a new branch of counseling, often likening it to a new theoretical orientation of sorts. In reality, the integration of neuroscience into clinical practice can best be conceptualized more as a metatheory of the clinical process that can be applied to every theoretical orientation.

This distinction has led some individuals to suggest that the term “neurocounseling” is to some degree misleading. Understanding the neurophysiological correlates of clients’ developmental levels, struggles, strengths and progress can all be used to inform and enhance all aspects of the clinical process, from case conceptualization and assessment to interventions and advocacy. It is a layer of information that we as mental health providers can use to enrich our understanding and work with clients. This knowledge of the brain and body can also be used to develop new theoretical approaches, such as neuroscience-informed cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), but it is not in and of itself a separate form of clinical practice.

Another misconception is that integrating neuroscience into our field and practice is just another way of medicalizing the profession. Relatedly, some have voiced fears that it takes too much of a reductionist view of clients and client struggles. Understanding the neurophysiological pathways of addiction, for example, does not negate or diminish the importance of the therapeutic relationship, but it can help us to decrease the internalized stigma some of our clients may have of being weak and, similarly, empower our clients in their own recovery. As another example, take some of the developing theories around depression. Researchers are working to further substantiate the divergent pathophysiology between possible subtypes or phenotypes of depression. This information can be used to help us develop more effective therapeutic approaches for our clients. Neuroscience is not a threat to our professional orientation; if anything, it can be used to strengthen what we uniquely do as counselors.

An additional misconception is that in order to integrate neuroscience into your practice, you need specialized and expensive equipment. Although biofeedback and neurofeedback are growing in popularity, efficacy and accessibility, and can certainly be used as part of informing and enhancing your work with clients, this is not the only way of integrating neuroscience. This is something that I like to really emphasize when discussing the role of neuroscience within the field. You do not need any fancy toys to benefit from all that neuroscience has to offer.

Just having the information related to how the brain and body respond to trauma completely changes the way that counselors conceptualize trauma survivors who are struggling with symptoms of posttraumatic stress. Similarly, knowing how the brain is developing during adolescence not only demystifies the struggles children and parents may face during this seemingly tumultuous time, but also changes how we approach working with individuals during this developmental period. The knowledge in and of itself can simply make us more intentional in our work.

The final misconception is one that is still somewhat debated even among those of us working in this area. I often get the question, “Do I actually need to learn the anatomy or physiology?” My answer to this is always a resounding “yes,” but I certainly do not speak for everyone working in this area. I am not suggesting that counselors need to be experts in neuroscience, but knowing the basic physiology and nomenclature allows counselors to understand the basis behind why a particular approach may be more beneficial for a particular client and be more intentional in that decision. It also allows counselors to continue reading the research that is coming out on a near-continuous basis. What we believe we know about the brain today may very well change tomorrow.

Also, fields that translate “hard” neuroscience research into applied contexts (education, peak performance, counseling, etc.) can at times fall victim to overextending and misrepresenting the original research as they attempt to retranslate other translations of the science. This may sound a bit convoluted, but what I mean is that one practitioner who is well-versed in neuroscience will translate the possible implications of some neuroscientific finding into practical and applied information for their particular field. Then another practitioner in an allied area may take that information and try to reapply the initial implications in a new way to the new field. This is the root cause of a number of the “neuromyths” that are currently circulating and why there are so many “brain training” games available today. In essence, we become too far removed from the actual science.

Our field needs to be able to do some of that translation firsthand and, ideally, build interdisciplinary research teams to collaborate in conducting the research rather than rely on translations from other fields.

One final rationale for training in basic anatomy and physiology is that we are seeing a growing number of integrated care practices and interdisciplinary treatment teams. Having a basic knowledge of the physiology allows counselors to collaborate more effectively with the other specialties and advocate for the best care of their clients.

What made you collaborate on a book about neurocounseling? Why do you feel it’s relevant and needed?

Lori Russell-Chapin: There are many neurocounseling experts throughout the United States. By joining forces, we can share this knowledge with so many other professionals who are interested. Integrating the concepts of neurocounseling from our book into my counseling has made me a more efficacious practicing counselor, counselor educator and counseling supervisor. The following short examples are offered to demonstrate why neurocounseling is relevant and needed in our counseling field.

Neurocounseling interventions strengthen the intentionality of counseling. Understanding the brain and its functions make skill selection and strategies even easier. Teaching self-regulation skills such as diaphragmatic breathing or physiological and emotion regulation requires many brain connections to connect together from the prefrontal cortex, the insula and the anterior cingulate cortex. The next time you teach any self-regulation skill, think about all the brain centers you are activating.

Understanding that rapport building and therapeutic alliance is essential to counseling and change is central to the tenets of neurocounseling and counseling. Both rapport and therapeutic alliance create emotional and physiological safety using the vagus system and interoception, helping the body be more aware of its senses. There is nothing more important to clients’ change than rapport and emotional safety.

Even as my clients are introducing themselves to me for the first time, I begin to experience them in a more holistic manner. With that first handshake, I can feel if their hand is cool, warm, sweaty or limp. Each of these symptoms is a clue to a person’s sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. If the client’s hand is very cold, then it might be that he or she is anxious, [thus] activating the sympathetic nervous system. I could easily teach diaphragmatic breathing, heart rate variability and skin temperature control to help initiate the parasympathetic nervous system where we are supposed to be most of the time.

Still another neurocounseling example is essential for building healthier neuroplasticity. Because of negative bias and the system’s evolutionary nature to survive, counselors must use our positive reflections lasting at least 10-20 seconds to deepen this change and build positive neuroplasticity. We remember a negative experience almost instantly. To remember a positive experience takes much longer.

Lastly, counselors must better understand that skills such as summarizations assist the client and the counselor to activate the default mode network. This network helps us see the world of self and others in a more comprehensive manner. Identifying the neuroanatomy aspect of our counseling skills allows for more intentionality and strategy in counseling. This is neurocounseling at its best. Then collaborating with others gives greater access to all this knowledge. Working together again offers the best method to expand the depth and breadth of neurocounseling.

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To join the ACA Neurocounseling Interest Network, contact Lori Russell-Chapin at lar@fsmail.bradley.edu. For more information, see neurocounselinginterestnetwork.com.

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Neurocounseling: Brain-Based Clinical Approaches is available both in print and as an e-book from the American Counseling Association bookstore at counseling.org/publications/bookstore or by calling 800-347-6647 x222

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Bethany Bray is a staff writer for Counseling Today. Contact her at bbray@counseling.org

Follow Counseling Today on Twitter @ACA_CTonline and Facebook at facebook.com/CounselingToday.

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Opinions expressed and statements made in articles appearing on CT Online should not be assumed to represent the opinions of the editors or policies of the American Counseling Association.