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COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course with Dr. Elyssa Helfer, a certified sex therapist and clinical sexologist, works to close the education gap on kink and BDSM for mental health professionals by centering consent, power exchange, and negotiation as clinical foundations. Listeners will learn how BDSM (bondage, discipline, dominance, submission, sadism, masochism) fits within the broader kink umbrella, how to distinguish healthy kink from abuse, and why porn and pop-media are unreliable models for practice. Dr. Helfer examines ethics, bias, and cultural humility, alongside data showing that about half of surveyed clinicians encounter kinky clients while only ~10% report any training—underscoring the need for competence, consultation, or referral.
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LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Upon completing this course, participants will be able to: List three or more core pillars of kink-competent practice, including consent, negotiation, and aftercare; Identify two risks of clinician bias when working with kinky clients and explain one strategy to mitigate each
TARGET AUDIENCE & INSTRUCTIONAL LEVEL
This course is intended for psychologists, therapists, social workers, clinical counselors, and addiction counselors. Instructional level: Intermediate
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HOW TO TAKE THIS COURSE
In order to receive a certificate of completion reflecting the associated CE credit hour, you must:
#1: Have an active paid Clearly Clinical membership
#2: Listen to the corresponding course podcast
#3: Achieve a passing grade on the post-presentation test (the test has up to ten questions and you must earn a score of at least 80%; users can re-test up to three times. After three attempts, users are advised to re-listen to the audio course in its entirety and then subsequently re-test. Psychologists who are seeking CE credit may not be awarded credit if they attempt to pass the post-test more than three times.)
#4: Complete the requested course evaluation.
Course elements (including the course audio, post-test, and requested course evaluation) can be completed on a computer or mobile device via your Clearly Clinical account.
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COURSE FORMAT
This course contains a one-hour, non-interactive audio podcast which is available for free on all major public podcast platforms, including YouTube, by searching for 'Clearly Clinical'. You can also listen to and download the audio file via our course player.
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ACCOMMODATIONS
If you have special needs or need an accommodation, please email us at [email protected] and we will do our best to assist you.
If reading along while listening is helpful for you, we recommend listening to our podcast on YouTube with the closed captioning feature enabled (to do this, click the button in the YouTube video player with the 'CC' on it).
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CERTIFICATE ACCESS DETAILS
Once you've completed the course, your certificate will automatically populate in the 'Certificate' section of your account; it will also be emailed to you. Course certificates will be on file for ten (10) years from date of course completion regardless of a user's paid membership status.
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COMMERCIAL SUPPORT
There is no known commercial support for this CE program, presenter, sponsor, instructor, or content. The instructor references their own resources as a potential option for further learning. The presenter has a possible bias relating to her clinical work with TASHRA, the Alternative Sexualities Health Research Alliance, a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the health and well-being of individuals involved in alternative sexualities