Mental Health Counselors Deserve A Prevailing Wage

Please let your voices be heard. Mental Health Counselors deserve to be recognized for the terrific work that they do.

This Bill will allow licensed professional counselors to provide behavioral health to Medicare recipients without a physician being physically present.

Please share an like our page.

https://www.counseling.org/news/updates/news-detail/2022/07/08/cms-proposed-rule-endorses-licensed-professional-counselors-as-medicare-providers

CMS Proposed Rule Endorses Licensed Professional Counselors as Medicare Providers Yesterday (July 7), the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued the Calendar Year 2023 Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) proposed rule. The rule contains several proposals intended to expand access to behavioral health services, including a proposal to allow marriage and family therapists (...

Professional Practice Committee: July 8 -2022 Chapter 230, among other things, amended the Education Law by defining “diagnosis” and “development of assessment-based treatment plans”; authorizing the Department to issue a limited permit to an applicant who is gaining experience for the diagnostic privilege; and authorizing licensed mental health counselors, licensed marriage and family therapists, and licensed psychoanalysts in certain settings approved by the Department to diagnose and develop assessment-based treatment plans through June 24, 2025.

Kathy Hochul and Democratic Legislature dropped the ball. Currently NY counselors are not allowed to diagnosis patients even though they have similar training as Social Workers.

Hochul and the State Leg decided to only give the diagnosing to Large Clinics. You know the Clinics where the counselors have to look at their computer the hole time and write notes.

This as we see it an EPIC Bait and Switch. The initial announcement made it sound like Counselors would be included. Some are and Some aren't. Only counselors who work on conveyor belt counseling will get this privilege's.

These clinics are more of a conveyor style often overloading the counselors leaving them no time to keep accurate notes and a high burnout rate.

Why you should care. This is a shot against counselors in private practice who set their own schedules and work independently to assure their patients get the best care.

Counselors seem to bed the whipping post for Albany.

The ability to diagnosis is critical. If the state refuses them their ability to diagnosis then how can they set up treatment plans.

So if you want to work for yourself, well that wont work because Albany and Hochul want you working for a Big System.

https://www.regents.nysed.gov/report/jul-2022/professional-practice

Report of Regents Professional Practice Committee to The Board of Regents | Board of Regents The Professional Practice Committee held its scheduled meeting on July 11, 2022. All members were present. Chancellor Lester W. Young, Jr., Regent Luis O. Reyes, Regent Susan W. Mittler, Regent Aramina Vega Ferrer, Regent Shino Tanikawa, and Regent Roger P. Catania also attended the meeting, but did...

Have you or do you accept insurance? What was it a good experience? https://www.psychology.org/resources/therapists-who-dont-accept-insurance/

Therapists Who Don't Accept Insurance | Psychology.org If you've ever tried to find a therapist, you know how difficult it can be. Finding one that accepts insurance is even harder. Find out why many therapists don't accept insurance.

A prevailing wage is the basic hourly rate of wages and benefits paid to a number of similarly employed workers in a given geography. Policymakers can use prevailing compensation levels to set wage and benefit floors for workers in the locality—for example, construction workers on government-funded projects in Minneapolis1 or security guards providing government contracted services in New York City.2 Prevailing wage laws can ensure that government dollars do not undercut local wage and benefit standards, prevent a race to the bottom among publicly funded contractors, support good jobs, and provide good value to taxpayers. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/prevailing-wages-frequently-asked-questions/

For all our counselors to see. Here is the new New York State mental health law. Take a read. See how it affects you. https://diagnosticprivilege.com/

NY LMHC Diagnostic Privilege Facts – Providing the truth and facts about NY's LMHC Diagnostic Privilege Law Access our ever-growing collection of resources and information about and how to obtain diagnostic privilege as a licensed mental health counselor in New York. We suggest checking back regularly for new tools as they are released.

To many times politicians have let the people down. When a person who turns a screw driver (NEW YORK COMPONSATES UNION CARPANTERS, ELECTRICIANS, LABORER, and PIPE FITTERS better than counselors, social workers and psychologist.

YOU ask why are they paid more. The true distinguishing feature of the groups is the gender disparity.

They're there when you need them. Lets be there when they need us.

https://money.cnn.com/gallery/pf/2014/06/17/stressful-jobs/4.html #:~:text=Money%20for%20mental%20health%20services,have%20master%27s%20degrees%20or%20higher.

Stressful jobs that pay badly Restaurant kitchen managers, vet techs, daycare directors... they all share one thing in common: Each day they take on a great deal of stress but don't get paid much for doing so.