Despite an increase in mental health conditions among children in the past decade and an extensive research evidence base on effective treatments, service organizations and providers continue to struggle to incorporate research evidence into routine mental health care, leading to inefficiencies and, ultimately, lower quality of life for children. Chorpita and colleagues will examine the use of research evidence in clinical supervision activities and subsequent treatment sessions and the downstream implications of such use on youth outcomes. The team will leverage and newly code a rich dataset from a trial of Child System and Treatment Enhancement Projects (STEPs) in California, which included extensive records of supervision and treatment activities and youth outcomes. They propose secondary data analysis using mixed effects regression models to examine how the supervisory “microecology” facilitates the use of research evidence in treatment activities and their association with weekly clinical youth outcomes. The project will analyze documentation from supervision meetings that were a part of a large randomized clinical trial for anxiety, trauma, depression and conduct problems for a diverse group of youth between ages 5-15 in a large public mental health system.
How do clinical supervisory decisions improve the use of research evidence in mental health treatment activities and youth mental health outcomes?
