Free guide · Monitoring
Caduceus and professional groups
Most monitoring contracts require a regular group meeting with other monitored professionals. In doctors’ cases they’re called caduceus groups; other professions have their own versions. Attendance is real: in our program’s case, we check in on the app to log that we were there.
What nobody tells you is that these meetings come in flavors, and the flavors are very different.
The three flavors
There’s the box-check. I’ve been to one group where this was just checking a box. We got together, we checked in on our app to say that we were there, and the shortest one I was ever at lasted seven and a half minutes. I remember that number because I had to drive about 35 minutes to get there and 35 minutes to get home, for a seven and a half minute, useless, but required meeting.
There’s the good one. The one I go to now is very positive and very supportive. Hey, what’s going on with you? What’s going on with you? How can we help this person, how can we help that person?
And then some of them run more negative. Sometimes it’s just a big gripe and moan session about being in this program and being monitored.
Why they matter anyway
The people in that room are the only people in your life going through the same contract you are. The good groups are where that starts to count for something, and the room is also where the practical knowledge lives: the parts of monitoring nobody publishes anywhere.
The year one page covers the rest of the rhythm these meetings sit inside.
What only your own contract and your own town answer
Whether a group is required in your contract, and how often. Which meetings exist near you, and which flavor each one is. Whether you get any choice between them.
Those genuinely vary. The fact that the room matters doesn’t.