History
The Tennessee Colleague Assistance Foundation (TCAF) is an independent, non-profit Tennessee corporation developed by psychologists for the purpose of providing rehabilitation and monitoring services for impaired mental healthcare providers. Throughout the process of developing our charter, mission statement, by-laws, policies/procedures, and monitoring protocols, we relied heavily on the support and guidance of some of the most highly respected psychologists and legal counsel in the state of Tennessee. Additionally, the Tennessee Psychological Association (TPA) played an integral role in helping to guide our foundation's development. Many of our members were involved with the development and operation of the TPA's Colleague Assistance Committee (CAC), which provided assistance to impaired psychologists and licensed psychological examiners for almost 20 years. The TCAF was designed to replace the CAC, which did not have a formal relationship with the Tennessee Board of Examiners (BOE) in Psychology. A monograph by the Advisory Committee on Colleague Assistance* (ACCA) of the American Psychological Association (APA) asserts that the most effective colleague assistance programs result from collaboration between state psychology associations and licensing boards. In keeping with this idea, the TCAF was developed in conjunction with TPA to have a formal relationship with the Tennessee BOE.
The TCAF's program is modeled after proven, successful colleague assistance programs, and will be run by highly competent providers with experience in the field of professional impairment. Additionally, the TCAF will utilize monitoring tools that have heretofore been excluded from other similar organizations. The TCAF has consulted with some of the top experts in the country in multiple areas (e.g., boundary violations in professional psychology practice) to assist with developing concise, tailored protocols for monitoring mental healthcare professionals struggling with specific issues. Dr. Brian Wind is co-founder of the TCAF and will serve as the TCAF Director of Services. Dr. Wind has extensive experience in the areas of addiction/recovery, professional impairment, and professional monitoring. Dr. Wind has several TCAF Associate Directors strategically placed in each of the three grand divisions of the state of Tennessee - east, middle, and west. The TCAF has also gathered a pool of invaluable resources from all over the country to provide education, evaluation, and treatment services those referred to our organization, and each of these organizations has a focus on addressing the specific needs of impaired professionals. The TCAF's philosophy is that impaired mental healthcare providers are a unique population and as such, clearly-developed, unique protocols for education, evaluation, rehabilitation, and monitoring will best serve this population and ensure long term success in "recovery." We are an organization of psychologists who are well-equipped to provide assistance to our colleagues.
*American Psychological Association Board of Professional Affairs' Advisory Committee on Colleague Assistance. (2006). Advancing colleague assistance in professional psychology. Washington, DC: Author. Available at: http://www.apa.org/practice/acca_monograph.pdf
