Personal Counselling Confidentiality

Your counsellor will review confidentiality with you during your first appointment.

Confidentiality includes, but is not limited to the following:
  • All contact information, including appointment times.
  • No information regarding your counselling appears in your academic file.
  • No one outside of the counselling office has access to any information about what was/is discussed in your counselling sessions, unless you give your signed permission for specific information to be shared.
  • You may revoke your signed permission to release information by informing your counsellor within a reasonable time frame.
  • If you are working with one of the Masters level ACSD counselling interns, your file notes will be reviewed by your intern's supervisor only, for the purposes of quality and accuracy.
confidentiality statement

Personal information provided on this form will not be disclosed to any person outside of Accessibility, Counselling & Student Development (ACSD) without your written consent.  The information that you provide on this form or to staff at ACSD is confidential, with the following exceptions that are required by law, and/or the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers and the College of Psychotherapists in order to ensure safety for you and others:

  • If you are in serious or imminent risk of harming yourself or another person.  One of our goals at ACSD is to foster a safe campus for you and others and we take this very seriously.  Any student whose words, actions, or behaviors present a potential risk of harm to others will not be tolerated and will be dealt with immediately.
  • If we have a reasonable suspicion of abuse or neglect for a youth 17 years of age or younger.
  • If you disclose that you are being or have been abused by a regulated health professional.
  • If you are involved in a legal proceeding, the court may subpoena our counselling records.
  • If you disclose that a person is being abused within a long-term care facility.

The College of Psychologists requires that client records be retained for a minimum of 10 years and the Ontario College of Social Workers and Social Service Workers requires that client records by retained for a minimum of 7 years.

Information about your faculty, year of study, your citizenship, your area of concern and any referral source will also be kept in your file.  This data will also be used as part of an aggregate database in order to provide information about the student population served by ACSD.  There will be no identifying information in the aggregate reports that are generated.

If you have any questions, please speak with your counsellor or with the Manager of Student Wellness.  You can email acsd@kings.uwo.ca.