Psychologists say quacks are posing as counsellors

Impostors are passing themselves off as psychologists and the government is doing nothing to stop them, advocates for the profession warn.

"Anyone can call themselves a counsellor or a psychologist in Hong Kong," said Dr Sammy Cheng Kin-wing, chairman of the Division of Clinical Psychology (DCP), part of the Hong Kong Psychological Society.

"We receive several complaints each year about people calling themselves clinical psychologists who do not have adequate training or even a bachelor's degree in psychology."

The DCP has been lobbying for statutory regulation for the industry for a decade, but the government has so far refused to regulate practitioners in the same way it monitors doctors, dentists or pharmacists.

A Department of Health spokesman said that in assessing whether a specific health care profession should have a registration system, "higher priority will be accorded to health care professions that provide direct clinical treatment".

Clinical psychologists are trained to diagnose and treat mental illness through psychological techniques, as opposed to psychiatrists, who treat disorders through medication.