Direct Client Contact Hours

Direct client contact (DCC) is any activity in which the client and the therapist are directly and formally engaged in the psychotherapeutic process. This may occur face-to-face, over the telephone, via video conferencing, or by email (with appropriate considerations for privacy and confidentiality). The client may be an individual, couple, family or group.

Also included in direct client contact are:

• Interviewing for intake, as long as this activity is clinical in nature and then used to determine the nature and course of the therapy;
• Interviewing, administering a test or conducting a formal assessment as part of clinical interaction with the client; and
• Facilitating or actively co-facilitating therapeutic sessions.

The following are not considered direct client contact:

• Practice and role-plays conducted within an educational/training program;
• Observing therapy without actively participating or providing follow-up to the client immediately after the observed session;
• Record-keeping;
• Administrative activities, including report-writing;
• Conducting a psychometric assessment that primarily involves administering, scoring and report-writing, with little or no clinical -interaction with the client; and
• Providing or receiving clinical or other forms of supervision.

Note: A 50-minute session qualifies as one hour of DCC. Hours can be calculated in 0.5 or 1-hour increments.