CBT Clinical Placements

kitkat.3b4t

I will be doing a postgrad in CBT soon and I need to organize my own clinical placements. I would prefer placements within the HSE and I have tried to contact the relevant departments but I keep being passed or told that someone will ring me but no one does.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to go about this? I would appreciate some advice.

JuliusCaesar

Can you work as an assistant psychologist? - but it'll probably be voluntary.

You'd need to look at various psychology depts, also day hospitals, day centres, counselling centres. Also specialised CBT within the Psychiatric Depts are usually provided by CNSs/ANPs.

Try babcp.com or the Irish Council for Psychotherapy for lists of accredited CBT therapists.

There'll always be a lot of burocracy getting work in the HSE. For a start they can't let unqualified people loose on their patients.

kitkat.3b4t

Thank you for your advice Julius. I am a HSE employee and work in psychiatric services as a Day Centre Instructor. I have an Hons Degree in Psychology and years of experience and in-service training. When I start my course in CBT I will be in training rather than unqualified. Since I am a HSE employee I had hoped that finding placements would not be too difficult. Do you think my expectations are too high?

eth0_

Where is the postgrad? I would have thought the university would organise the placement for you?

kitkat.3b4t

As all CBT courses are postgrad they expect students to have clients already. Some courses arrange a certain amount of placements but I dont know if any courses arrange all. There are only two fully accredited courses and they are in England. The courses in Ireland are at Trinity, Queens and the Belfast Cognitive Centre. These courses are not fully accredited, although they do fulfill a lot of the training requirments stipulated by the BABCP. To become fully accredited I need to be supervised by someone who is already fully accredited with the BABCP. Finding the right person is still proving a little difficult, although I have been given a number of contacts.

eth0_

How do you get clients if you're not qualified? It sounds very catch 22 to me.

Can I ask how you got your current HSE job (do you have a masters?) and what it entails?
I'm thinking of going down the CBT route myself.

kitkat.3b4t

Hi ethno
I have been in my current job with the HSE for over 8 years. Although there is no room for promotion etc my role has evolved over the years, as I have gained experiece and skills. The role is mainy adult education. Like most teachers I have had to develop counselling skills, particularly since my clients have mental health problems. I sudied psychology and adult education while working in my current job, so I have been able to apply my knowledge as I go along.

The requirments of the BABCP for accreditation usually are that the person holds a core degree which allows them to belongs to a professional body. Because psychology graduates are only graduate members of the BPS and PSI they cannot go straight from a degree course to study CBT. Usually the requirments for psychologists is a doctural degree such as clinical, educational etc. Whereas the requiremets for professions like teachers is just a HDip in education. For some reason the core requirements of psychologists is higher than all the other professions.

Anyway the point I want to make is if you want to get an accrediated postgrad qualification in CBT you must have either a recognized core profession or a combination of education and work experience which is deemed to be equivalant. A degree in psychology is not much good by itself and you will probably have to do some postgrad study before you can study CBT. Clinical and educational psychology postgrad courses are nearly impossible to get on. Because of the lengthy study and overly academic requirments I'm beginning to think a psychology career path is desiged specifically with peopole from the younger age groups in mind.