Professional Positions on Online Psychosocial Care in Canada: A Review of Current Policy Statements

Abstract

With the advent of online mental health care, concerns related to online practice are emerging among mental health professionals. This paper assesses and organizes the current status of several professions in Canada—including medicine, nursing, psychology, counselling, and social work—on the issue of practice via the internet, so that these professions may be productively compared and considered. Psychology, social work, and counselling have few stated e-health policies within their regulatory colleges, and those that do exist are conservative and tend towards restricting mental health practice online. The remaining hurdle for e-health, including online psychosocial care development, is cross-provincial practice—which, in turn, appears to rest on the definition of “where therapy resides” in the event of legal action.