Appointments and Confidentiality
Appointments
CAPS expects that scheduled appointments are attended, and if a student is not able to attend that they notify CAPS in advance of the appointment. We understand that things come up but would like to be respectful of the clinician’s time and other students’ time. We do not have minimum or maximum session limits, as treatment is based on students’ therapeutic goals and reaching those goals as partners in therapy.
Remote appointments: CAPS provides remote therapy services as well as in-person appointments. Students have the option to choose whichever is preferrable to them. We utilize a HIPAA compliant version of Zoom. If meeting remotely, students must be in the state of Connecticut and will have to confirm their physical location with their counselor at each session. We are not able to see students in other states.
Additional spaces are available around campus for students who do not have a confidential space to access a remote therapy session, such as private study rooms which can be reserved in the campus library. We encourage students to be proactive and seek out a space for therapy if their dorm or apartment does not afford much privacy. Given that we are working remotely, we can see students who are not physically on campus, although the student must be within the state of Connecticut as we are not permitted to see students across state lines.
Confidentiality
We are committed to providing all our students with confidential counseling services. All communication and therapy will remain securely confidential between the client and the treatment team, and CAPS will not speak to any outside parties without consent from the client. This includes other university members, family members, or other students. There are some exceptions to our ability to maintain strict confidentiality, and these include maintaining students’ safety (primarily related to suicidal and homicidal ideation) and mandated reporting requirements as they relate to child, elder, and disabled adult abuse.