In an effort to make advocacy easy and accessible to all of our members, the Advocacy Committee Chair will be providing you all with a monthly call to action. This is a meaningful and impactful way for you to stay involved and advocate for important topics surrounding clinical social work in California.

This month, we encourage you to take action on the World Health Organization’s (WHO) limitation on mental health treatment methods. The WHO issued a manual in which they describe various treatment modalities and make recommendations for evidence-based treatment practices. Our parent organization, Clinical Social Work Association (CSWA) brought up concerns with this, primarily because the WHO places emphasis on Behavior Therapy (BT) and Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) which diminishes the importance of other treatment modalities. While BT and CBT are well-known treatment modalities, they should not be considered the only effective treatment modalities. 

To see the WHO’s Psychological Interventions Implementation Manual click here:

https://www.issup.net/files/2024-03/psychological%20interventions%20implementation%20manual.pdf.

To view and sign the PsiAN petition, click here:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeV5toz31ab2v-feDPgnLYfmg6OidsI7FRaHc5EKi-sPtlIcQ/viewform.

Reach out to the advocacy committee chair for additional guidance and support

Veronica Yakovenko, LCSW

Advocacy Chair

CSCSW

vytherapist@gmail.com