2012 Pre-Conference Workshops

AMHCA offers two pre-conference workshops for 2012. These will take place on Thursday, July 19, 2012.

Judith Harrington, Ph.D., LPC, LMFT Suicide Prevention, Intervention, and Postvention During an era when hospitalization for suicidality is limited in length of stay or in readily available admissions, clinicians experience more demands for comprehensive care management and intervention. This workshop will highlight current thinking about suicide prevention as a national health imperative, review current practice for assessment and formulation of risk, emphasize practices for treatment and intervention, define postvention as it relates to attempt survivors and loss survivors, and identify loss survivors' protracted bereavement due to complicated grief, stigma, and trauma. Judith Harrington, Ph.D., LPC, LMFT, is an approved trainer for the Assessing and Managing Suicidal Risk curriculum for mental health professionals on behalf of the Suicide Prevention Resource Center (SPRC - SAMHSA) and the American Association of Suicidology (AAS). Since 2004, she has been highly active with the formerly named Alabama Suicide Prevention Task Force, now acting as its first full-term President as a non-profit organization referred to as ASPARC - the Alabama Suicide Prevention and Resources Coalition. She is in full-time private practice providing therapy and consultation since 1988.

Michael Kahn, LPC, JD Reel to Real: Ethical and Professional Issues for Therapists Therapists and therapy are often portrayed in films with varying degrees of accuracy. Nevertheless, real therapists and other helping professionals can learn a great deal about themselves from "reel" therapists. The workshop will include provocative film clips, which often are an entertaining, powerful, and effective means for elaboration and discussion. This presentation will provide a forum for helping professionals to discuss ethical questions and related professional issues. It is designed to be interactive and will offer hypothetical vignettes to explore. Reference will be made to relevant professional codes of ethics, including counseling, social work, and psychology. Michael has a B.A. in Psychology from Emory University (1982), a law degree from the Dickinson School of Law (1985), and a Masters in Education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (1994). He is an LPC and a nationally certified counselor. His areas of interest include grief and men's issues. Michael lectures and facilitates workshops in the U.S. and internationally on grief, diversity, self-care, and ethics, including work with the U.S. military here and in Germany. He also presents ethics workshops to attorneys. He is among the forefront in his field on the use of film in group therapy and workshops. In his free time, Michael makes documentary films.

Registration available soon!