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PA Mental Health Counselors Association
PAMHCA Advocate | |
| Issue 2 Number 1 |
Spring 2009 |
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WANTED: Newsletter Contributions
Please consider submitting a comment on something you may have read here, an article that reflects a special interest or a bio of yourself -- we want to get to know you.
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| MARK YOUR CALENDARS!
 The theme for the 2009 Annual AMHCA
Conference is "CONNECTION, HEALING & WHOLENESS:
Strengthening Individuals, Families & Communities
Through Mental Health Counseling & Advocacy"
July 23-25 at
the Washington Court Hotel
525 New Jersey Avenue, NW
Washington DC
 Save the date for the AMERICAN COUNSELING ASSOCIATION (ACA) Conference
on March 19-23, 2009 at the Charlotte Convention Center
501 South College Street
Charlotte, NC
Check out AMHCA and ACA websites for registration information and conference details.
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PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
HAPPY NEW YEAR
& WELCOME TO 2009
This has been a productive year for PAMHCA. We began holding monthly Breakfast Networking Gatherings in the Philadelphia area as well as collaborating with the Pennsylvania Counseling Association (PCA) to present seminars for graduate students, and launched an e-newsletter and a website. In October PAMHCA Board members presented The Life Cycle of a Counselor at PCA's annual conference, and hosted a table with mental health literature=2
0from AMHCA and PAMHCA for counselors, and especially graduate students to read and take with them.
In 2009 we plan to
- Continue our efforts to build regional Breakfast Networking Gatherings
- Increase membership in other parts of Pennsylvania
- Provide CEU credits to members by offering workshops in Philadelphia and the other regions of Pennsylvania.
We have numerous opportunities for our members to be involved with PAMHCA, from being on our board to submitting articles/comments to our e-newsletter.
As President of PAMHCA, I am a representative for you on AMHCA's North Atlantic Regional Chapter and the Executive Board of PCA. I envision a larger membership that represent all regions of Pennsylvania and who come together to solidify our chapter. In that way making it a more powerful chapter that can work on legislative issues in Harrisburg and Washington, D.C., and be a voice for counselors and our patients and clients in the Keystone State. Recently an article was published in the AMHCA Advocate newsletter re: the progress PAMHCA has made. If anyone is interested in working with board members, Nicki Covey and Frank Hadden, on marketing PAMHCA to graduate students please do!! We need your help to make it happen.
Please visit our PAMHCA web-site at PAMHCA.org. Contact Nicki Covey, our Membership Chairperson, at nac75@aol.com for information on renewing your PAMHCA membership and Minna Davis, our Newsletter Editor, at msminna@comcast.net for our e-newsletter, especially if your contact information has changed.
We appreciate your continued commitment and membership in PAMHCA. We welcome your support and involvement. Please contact me with questions or comments.
Sincerely,
Mary Ann Baron MGPGP, LPC, NCC
President, PAMHCA
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NOT FOR THE FEINT OF HEART
Nov 16 - 18, 2008
PAMHCA member Frank Hadden recently participated in a weekend workshop offered by the Pennsylvania Gestalt Center. Led by therapist and author Mari
ah Fenton Gladis, MMS, QCSW, the workshop was experiential and didactic, blending individual and group work, music, spiritual practices and body work. A strong aspect of the workshop was the use of music to help create "exact moments of healing," a hallmark of the Center's approach. The overall atmosphere was one of trust and mutual support built upon Gestalt principles. The Center views "Gestalt Therapy" as a lively and holistic experiential approach to healing and personal growth that emphasizes the development of awareness - emotional, physical, intellectual and spiritual, and the capacity to make healthy contact with one's self, others and the environment.
This particular workshop was designed to support the creation of healthy relationships within healthy lives and its focus was on emotional injuries that may have occurred in the past, recurring themes or patterns of dysfunction, or personal longings in the here and now. The Center believes the workshop may be particularly helpful for adult children of dysfunctional families, human service professionals working with ACAs and those on a path of personal betterment.
Besides Mariah Fenton Gladis, workshop co-leaders included Dori Middleman, M.D. and Mark Putnam, M.D. More information can be found at www.gestaltcenter.com.
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HOW PAMHCA CAN HELP YOU
PAMHCA can help support you as a graduate student or as a new or seasoned clinician in several ways:
- Share information regarding legislative issues important to you, such as licensing and parity.
- Invite you to join Breakfast Networking Gatherings to meet colleagues, share our work and discuss professional opportunities.
- Circulate a quarterly e-newsletter to which you can submit articles, comments and questions.
- Offer workshops designed to broaden your learning and to serve as future sources of continuing education units.
- Provide opportunities to volunteer and work on programs and services with other students and practitioners.
- Serve as your representative on the PCA Executive Council and in the American Mental Health Counseling Association (AMHCA).
If you would like to learn more about PAMHCA you can visit our websit
e or contact our Membership Co-Chair, Nicki Covey at nac75@aol.com .
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AMHCA'S PUBLIC POLICY & LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE
Legislative Agenda
110th Congress, Second Session
Federal Legislative Issues:
- Enact legislation to allow mental health counselors to be reimbursed by Medicare;
- Eliminate discriminatory physician referral and supervision requirements under TRICARE;
- Ensure through legislation or regulation that mental health counselors are recognized by a full range of federal programs, including the Federal Employee Health Benefits (FEHB) Program;
- Enact legislation to list mental health counselors as core mental health providers.
- Monitor federal medical records confidentiality regulations;
State Legislative Issues:
- Enact counselor licensure legislation in California; licensure law in California;
- Protect the rights of mental health counselors to utilize testing instruments;
- Enact legislation, where needed, to name mental health counselors as providers for state employee health benefits plans;
- Update certification and title laws to practice acts in applicable states;
- Ensure that mental health counselors are named as providers for Medicaid; and
- Enact mandatory reimbursement laws for mental health counselors.
Dan Holdinghaus, LPC, Chair
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Recap of Legislative Gains Achieved This Year
[Adapted from Mental Health America]
Mental Health Parity Becomes Law
Mental health advocates can mark 2008 as a year in which they helped win passage of a landmark law to bring mental health parity protection to more than 100 million Americans covered by group health insurance. Passage of the Paul Wellstone and
Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act owes much to a relentless battle we've waged together to educate lawmakers, win their support for comprehensive parity legislation, and persuade them to make parity's enactment a vital priority.
We successfully ended that years-long fight this month on the heels of another critical victory toward ending all discrimination against people with mental health needs legislation that will phase out the inequitable 50 percent co-pay requirement on outpatient mental health care under the Medicare program. These longstanding discriminatory practices have helped keep stigma alive. With each legislative victory over discrimination we come closer to the day that all people view mental health conditions as no different than any other health condition.
Budget Cuts Defeated
The determined advocacy efforts that won these large victories also helped block several harmful Administration proposals that threatened to set back earlier gains. Grassroots' voices were critical in moving Congress to block implementation of several major Medicaid cuts, including sweeping changes that would have dramatically limited reimbursement for rehabilitative, case management, and school-based administrative services. Similarly thousands responded to our messages urging individuals to press Congress to reject Administration-proposed budget cuts that would have very substantially reduced funding supporting mental health needs under numerous federal programs. Our combined efforts led Congress to
reject those destructive cuts.
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PAMHCA Board 2008
Mary Ann Baron, MGPGP, LPC, NCC
President
maryannbaron3@yahoo.com
John Flynn, D. Min., MA, NCC, LPC
President-Elect
Secretary
pres_elect@pamhca.org
Ed Badeau, MA, NCC, CAC, LPC
Past President
past_pres@pamhca.org
Nicki Covey, MS, NCC
Treasurer
Membership Chair
Legislative & Policy Chair
Webmaster
Frank Hadden, JD, M.Ed.
Member-at-large
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PAMHCA
is the mental health counselor's resource for Pennsylvania, connected to
PCA (Pennsylvania Counseling Association) and
AMHCA (American Mental Health Counselors Association).
Our board, which meets four times annually, is composed of practicing clinicians committed to the counseling profession and practitioners in the mental health field, including graduate students who are crucial to our future.
Our mission is to enhance the profession of mental health counseling through licensing, advocacy, education and professional development in Pennsylvania.
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