The American Psychological Association has just released its guidelines for the practice of telepsychology. Some state psychological associations have already released their own guidelines. These guidelines are important because the Internet is filled with offers of cyber counseling, internet counseling, on-line psychotherapy, personal psychological testing and the like. None of these offerings are currently regulated by any regulating group. It is possible that no such regulation will exist for some time to come. Guidelines (note that these are not "standards") take years to become translated into practice laws in the various states and provinces of the US and Canada. Practice laws often don't exist in other countries where Internet access is easily available.
Slowly, the efficacy of telepsychology is being established. There is every reason to believe that interventions via technology--as opposed to sitting in a practitioner's office--will prove to be a safe, effective, less-expensive and more accessible alternative to traditional care. However there are still a number of issues that will need to be addressed before reliable telepsychology services will be practical.
One is that many times these services are not yet reimbursable under current insurance programs.
Another is that, although the technology is improving, full confidentiality cannot yet be guaranteed, although I believe that this problem can be pretty well dealt with in the near future.
Third, and in my estimation the most important, is that practice across state and international boundaries may have substantial legal obstacles. A colleague and I did some research about 10 years ago in preparation for an article about the unintended consequences of increasing technology on the practice of psychology. The literature at that time indicted that every State's Attorney General in each US state indicated that he/she would need to take a hard look at internet practice by psychologists unlicensed in their respective states--that is, those who are licensed in other states but not their state. Therefore it is also not clear whether malpractice insurance would protect a practitioner practicing across state lines. The safest level of practice of telepsychology at this time is practice done solely within the state where one is licensed.
Another concern we discovered in researching the article was that the legal jurisdiction for bringing suit for online practice may be unclear. There were some who were suggesting that electronic data that is transmitted through servers that were located outside the state one is practicing in might be considered in determining the legal jurisdiction in which a practitioner could be sued. Thus, if one practice in Florida but the web data were transmitted through servers in Georgia, New York, Wyoming and California on the way to and from the client, there might be the possibility that a lawyer could bring suit in any of those other states if that offered advantages to the plaintiff. A psychologist from Miami, Florida might have to defend herself in California in a suit brought by a client across town. I am not an attorney, so I have no way of judging the validity of such an argument, but it is enough to want to have good legal advice before deciding to engage in the provision of telepsychology services.
Another prominent issue for possible patients is that there is currently no way to assess the credentials of those offering telepsychology services. There is no clearinghouse that one can go to to be assured that the person offering services is qualified to do so and is the person they claim to be. This may not present a problem to someone who has already met the person they are working with, but might be a problem for someone making a first contact online. (Coincidentally, there may be no way for a therapist to be sure that the client they have engaged with is genuine.)
Another concern for both psychologist and patient is the possible need for immediate, emergency services for the patient who needs them. Psychologists practicing in their own communities usually have knowledge of emergency services available to their patients and ways of engaging crisis interventions for them. That will probably not be true when their patients reside in other communities. Even with careful pre-screening of patients, these events could present significant distress and/or danger to patients and significant distress and liability to telepsychology practitioners.
There are some other issues regarding telehealth practice that are in the process of being looked at in the profession, such as whether any system for providing therapeutic services is superior to any other type of system and whether computer-assisted interventions can serve as a primary method of treatment rather than just as an adjunct. Seldom discussed is whether the therapist's right of privacy can be breached by a client who downloads and records a therapy sesssion and shares it with others. Could one end up with a therapy session uploaded to YouTube and what would be the implications?
I believe that each of the concerns I have mentioned above can be solved, some more quickly than others, of course. The reluctance that many older people have about providing or recieving telehealth and telepsychology services does not appear to be shared by the "millenial" generation who have grown up with computers, cell phones and the Internet. They have routinely shared very personal information through social media outlets and have been tracked all of their lives by Internet search engines. Their expectations of privacy seem to be very low; sometimes I believe that we professionals must take extra steps to protect them from their lack of care about that when it comes to telehealth services. We cannot afford to be careless. We do need to take telepsychology services seriously and we need to work diligently to make sure that they are provided safely and effectively. This is not going to go away.