Mental Health Council of Australia Fails to Support ACA's & PACFA's Bid for Medicare Rebates

HypnosisAustralia, May 2008

By Dr Tracie O'Keefe DCH, Clinical Hypnotherapist, Psychotherapist & Counsellor
Editorial Director of HypnosisAustralia Online.

The Psychotherapy And Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA) and Australian Counselling Association (ACA) are both members of the Mental Health Council of Australia (MHCA), and both represent hypnotherapists. This is an organisation that also represents over 50 member organisations as a coalition from nurses and social workers to physicians, all working in mental health, as well as consumer groups. The MHCA describes itself as follows:

"The Mental Health Council of Australia (MHCA) is the peak, national non-government organisation representing and promoting the interests of the Australian mental health sector, committed to achieving better mental health for all Australians."

Last year the MHCA publicly supported the setting up of the proposed Australian National Council of Mental Health (ANCMH) as a way to have input with governments in directing and deciding health policy and spending. Such a body it was proposed would have a new way of supplying expert input from consumers, carers, community organisations, researchers and the health and social welfare fields directly into policy, making the mental health system more responsive. It has also in the past called for a specific mental health commission composed of experts in the field to be part of all government decision-making processes regarding mental health policy. Certainly the greater cooperation within Council of Australian Governments (COAG) during the recent few years could also bring hope for smoothing over of the state and federal divide in health policy disparities.

We approached the MHCA with the following questions:

Is the MCHA supporting ACA's & PACFA's bid for Medicare rebates for clients? If so why or if not why not?
Given the present mental health crisis in Australia, and the recent British study that finds antidepressants to be on the whole ineffective, how important do you see counsellors and psychotherapists and hypnotherapists on the ACA and PACFA registers gaining rebates for clients?
Since many therapists train equally as long as psychologists would you see such rebates as needing to be equivalent to what is presently being awarded to psychologists' clients?
As you may know, such rebates have been available for years in the UK which has aided the mental health system. How urgent do you see this matter here in Australia and why?

Their reply to the above questions was:

"The MHCA represents over 50 member organisations, many of whom have different agendas, issues, approaches and directions in terms of how they provide help, treatment and services to their clients. In order for us to best advocate and represent our members, we have always operated on evidence-based strategies. With the MBS report issued last year by the MHCA, the Council analysed the evidence available by the Department of Health and Ageing before advocating a position on the MBS scheme. Even then, as with the MBS items, how the governments choose to roll out new initiatives is entirely their decision. Key aspects of the new psychology items were not exactly as advocated by the MHCA.

In order for the MHCA to consider its position on Medicare rebates, we would require a similar evidence-based analysis which would detail:
" Evidence of how psychotherapy and hypnotherapy specifically benefits people with mental illness or mental health problems;
" Evidence of how treatment or the lack of treatment by psychotherapists and hypnotherapists is impacting on the recovery and resilience of people with mental illness;
" Details regarding the ratio and/or number of patients seen by psychotherapists and hypnotherapists who have mental health problems;
" Any studies or research into the use of psychotherapy and hypnotherapy in the successful treatment of mental illness and related conditions.

This type of evidence-based documentation is essential for us in our advocacy and information role and would be critical to any call by the MHCA for the government to expand the Medicare rebates scheme. In particular, the MHCA is always ready to advocate for treatments proven to provide positive mental health outcomes for people.

Lastly, the MHCA does not agree that anti-depressants are ineffective. I have enclosed (below) two media clippings from yesterday FYI."

It is curious in their response that they asked for incontrovertible evidence of the efficacy of hypnosis and the talking therapies but then went to quote newspaper articles as evidence of the effectiveness of antidepressants. Hypnotherapy does not lend itself to quantative studies since like psychotherapy or counselling it is an experiential discipline. There are of course libraries full of the qualitative evidence of these disciplines which medicine, psychiatry and psychology rely upon. How curiously the wind seems to change when one points a boat where one wants it to go.

So is the MHCA a quango by any other name? Maybe - but one thing is for sure is that it only represents the interests of the members it chooses to. The real question, however, is why exactly are ACA and PACFA members when the MHCA do not seem to have clue what it is that those organisations' members do?

©HypnosisAustralia, May 2008