Maintaining Ethical Standards
Rebecca Harshman
BEH/335
Carrie Hill

I chose the case study of Ludwig, the therapist for a woman named Ella. Ella presented to him as an individual client. He determined that a great deal of the issues that Ella was facing were because of the family relationships that she had. Abandonment being one of the biggest ones, realizing that, he pondered whether or not he should refer Ella to a client who was a family therapist for further treatment but decided against it fearing that she would feel that he too had abandoned her.
There were a couple of errors in the decision-making process on the part of Ludwig when it came to his client Ella. I feel that before anything was done with this particular case that there should have been a couple of consultations. The first one being with a supervisor or manager to discuss what may have been in Ella’s best interest in regards given her situation. The second consult, pending the outcome of the first should have been with Ella herself about what she thought was going to be the easiest transition for her when presented with the options that she had before her. I do think that ultimately, Ludwig should have continued with his process of referral to a more experienced therapist in regards to her family relationship and the issues involved with that, even if it took time for Ella to come to terms with the transition to another therapist for any treatment that would have been forthcoming that involved her family. I do not personally feel that he would have had to stop the individual counseling with her as I am sure that she had issues with other things that she could have benefitted from. He could have done joint-sessions if necessary with the new therapist until Ella was more comfortable with her new therapist as well if Ella decided that she wanted him there. I guess this avenue could also have caused a dependency though that may not have been healthy overall for her dependency on him. But, if he did individual but allowed the other therapist to address the issues stemming from