§ 4082. Definitions

As used in this chapter:

(1) "Board" means the Board of Allied Mental Health Practitioners established under section 3262a of this title.

(2) "Disciplinary action" includes any action taken by the Board against a person who is entered on the Roster or who applies for entry on the Roster, premised on a finding of unprofessional conduct. It includes all sanctions of any kind, such as refusal to enter a person on the Roster or to renew a Roster entry, suspension or revocation of the person's right to be entered on the Roster, issuing warnings, limitations on a person's right to practice, and other similar sanctions.

(3) "Psychotherapist who is nonlicensed and noncertified" means a person who practices psychotherapy and is neither a licensed psychologist, clinical social worker, or mental health counselor, nor a certified marriage and family therapist or a psychoanalyst.

(4) "Psychotherapy" means the provision of treatment, diagnosis, evaluation, or counseling services to individuals or groups, for a consideration, for the purpose of alleviating mental disorders. "Psychotherapy" involves the application of therapeutic techniques to understand unconscious or conscious motivation, resolve emotional, relationship, or attitudinal conflicts, or modify behavior that interferes with effective emotional, social, or mental functioning. "Psychotherapy" follows a systematic procedure of psychotherapeutic intervention that takes place on a regular basis over a period of time, or, in the case of evaluation and brief psychotherapies, in a single or limited number of interventions. If a person is employed by or under contract with the Agency of Human Services, this definition does not apply to persons with less than a master's degree; to persons providing life skills training or instruction, such as learning to make friends, to handle social situations, to do laundry, and to develop community awareness; or interactions of employees or contracted individuals with clients whose job description or contract specifications do not specifically mention "psychotherapy" as a job responsibility or duty.

(5) "Roster" means the list of psychotherapists who are nonlicensed and noncertified that is maintained by the Office of Professional Regulation in the Office of the Secretary of State. (Added 1993, No. 222 (Adj. Sess.), § 17; amended 1997, No. 40, § 66; 1997, No. 145 (Adj. Sess.), § 26; 2005, No. 27, § 98.)