A caregiver asks you whether a medication is working or should change

• Medication question

The situation

A parent or caregiver asks your opinion about the learner's medication — whether it seems to be helping, whether the dose seems right, whether to skip it on session days, or whether a behavior you see could be a side effect. They ask because you see the learner often and they trust you.

Contact now

• Nurse or medical staff
• Your supervising BCBA
• Parent or guardian

Right now

Nothing you say here should be medical advice. Tell the caregiver that questions about medication are for the prescriber, offer to share your objective session data with the medical team through your supervisor, and never suggest starting, stopping, skipping or changing anything.

Write down

• Record the question the caregiver asked and what you told them.
• Record any behavior change the caregiver attributes to medication, as objective observations only.
• Tell your supervisor the same day so that data can be shared with the medical team if the family wishes.

Advising on medication is outside the scope of a behavior technician and of a behavior analyst. Objective behavior data can be genuinely useful to a prescriber, and sharing them goes through the supervising analyst and the consent process.

Terms used here

• Scope of Practice
• Objective Language
• Collaboration