A private psychologist who carries out treatment on behalf of Region Uppsala is severely criticized in an audit report.
During psychotherapy treatment, a 16-year-old patient was asked, among other things, to look at nude pictures – both on his computer and the psychologist’s. After that, the person must have been asked to imagine what it is like to rape someone and then write it down in I form. The patient has also been advised to have nude images as the background image on his mobile phone.
The visits were linked to sexuality
The review was initiated by the region itself and was carried out by whistleblowers who read journal entries.
It shows, among other things, that the patient suffers from intellectual disability and obsessive-compulsive disorder. The patient is also placed in a family home due to abuse in the home and the psychologist visits are, according to the medical record, linked to sexuality.
“It is a very serious thing to ask a young, intellectually disabled person to imagine raping someone. Especially as there is great anxiety associated with sexuality in this patient,” the report states.
The person must also have demonstrated post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), although this has not been determined, according to the review report.
“It cannot be ruled out that the care provider exposed the patient to suffering during this treatment and that this could have been avoided if other interventions had been chosen”.
Region: “Completely unsuitable”
Mikael Köhler is director of health and medical care in Region Uppsala and takes the incident very seriously.
– You get pissed off, he says.
– I am not an expert in psychotherapy, but there is some type of methodology where you have to expose yourself to past experiences. However, at this level and for this patient, it is completely inappropriate.
He says that Region Uppsala wants to end the relationship with the company, at least with the one who provided the care. Child and adolescent psychiatry has been informed of the incident and the region has been asked to consider the Ivo report.
– I’m not sure we’ve done it, but we’ll do it anyway, says Mikael Köhler.
The region has also demanded reimbursement of 1.9 million due to financial inaccuracies linked to the billing of patient visits.