The Case for Prescription Privileges: A Logical Evolution of Professional Practice

Responding to society's needs: Prescription privileges for psychologists

“…In the mid-1970s California had a number of programs where nonmedical professionals were trained to evaluate patients for medications and to prescribe medication (DeLeon, Folen, Jennings, Willis, & Wright, 1991). One of these programs was an early attempt to create a new profession of mental health practitioners who had prescribing authority; this program graduated professionals with a doctorate in mental health (Wallerstein, 1992).…”

“…The Hawaii Psychological Association was encouraged to seek prescription privileges in 1984 by Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) because "He believed that a significant segment of the state's population was not having their mental health needs met appropriately and that granting prescription privileges to psychologists would be an important step toward alleviating this problem" (DeLeon, Folen, et al, 1991;Gutierrez & Silk, 1998, p. 214). Hawaii was the first state to attempt passage of such legislation (Cummings, 1990).…”

Online sexual addiction and compulsivity: Integrating web resources and behavioral telehealth in treatment

“…Telehealth involves using technology to provide medical and psychological services (Bashshur, 1997;Council on Competitiveness, 1996;DeLeon, Sammons, Frank, & VandenBos, in press) and been defined as "the use of telecommunications and information technology to provide access to health assessment, diagnosis, intervention, consultation, supervision, education, and information across distance" (Nickelson, 1998b, p. 527). Technologies used to provide Telehealth services include traditional telephone, videophones, and interactive video on the Internet Behavioral Telehealth may be used to provide patient education, assessment, diagnosis, and treatment, including crisis intervention, psychotherapy, and prescription of psychotropic medications (Administrative Rules of Montana, 1995;DeLeon, Folen, Jennings, & Willis, 1991;DeLeon & Wiggins, 1996;McCarthy, Kulakowski, & Kenfield, 1994;Nickelson, 1998~;Stamm, 1995Stamm, , 1998. Currently Behavioral Telehealth represents over 20% of Telehealth practice in the United States (DeLeon et al, in press) and is the fastest growing area of Telehealth (D. Puskin, personal communication, April 22, 1999).…”

Prescriptive authority for psychologists: A looming health hazard?

“…The prescription privilege movement is divisive within psychology as well as between psychology and medicine (Piotrowski, 1989). The prescriptive privilege movement within psychology emanated from practitioners rather than academicians, who initially refrained from addressing it (Burns et al, 1988; DeLeon, Fox, et al, 1991). Training directors of existing psychology programs remain equivocal about it (Evans & Murphy, 1997), and relatively few academic psychologists appear interested in developing training programs (Hanson et al, 1999).…”