Measurement-based care helps us identify how well clients progress during therapy. Our recent article discussed why this evidence-based approach helps. So how do we conduct measurement-based care in mental health to effectively help our clients?
The process of measurement-based care in mental health is simple: We collect information on patient progress from the outcomes of measurement surveys. Next, we share the results with clients. Then, we act on the results by doing more of what works, changing our approach in therapy, or some mix of both.
Sounds easy, right? There are a few considerations and pitfalls to the process. Here are some tips to make measurement-based care in mental health work better for you and your clients.
- Get informative feedback. Feedback appears most helpful when measures of client symptoms are given more than once (versus just once). Tracking results over time (maybe even in a line graph) is a good place to start. Evidence-based treatments for PTSD often give clients the PCL-5 every other session.
- Share the results with clients. Informing clients about what the results (versus just for therapist knowledge) improves outcomes. This opens the door to having an honest conversation about therapy. It allows your client to share what they think helps and does not help. And who doesn’t want clients to be more vocal about their needs?
- Act on the feedback. Using feedback may be a no-brainer. But feedback is helpful only when therapists use it to make a change. We often don’t want to hear when our efforts to help someone are not helping. None of us are perfect, though! Using additional info from measurement-based care in mental health to supplement our judgement only helps!
- Make useful changes. Making singular personalized changes for the client (versus a lot of changes at once) can help. Experiences with similar clients, or colleague consultation groups, and/or consulting research all help determine which changes will help.
To find free validated measures, bridge’s assessment page has common established measures. For the digitally-inclined, there is a good tool that incorporates client surveys and scores into session notes.
Measurement-based care in mental health is a very effective therapist resource for evidence-based practice. Like our clients and everyone else, we’re not perfect at our work. Luckily, therapist resources like validated surveys and their results give us a chance to be more aware and more effective for our clients.
