Mental health program reduces symptoms for children
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Researchers analysed data from 2,702 patients receiving mental healthcare within pediatric primary care clinics in an unnamed location.
The program embedded mental health clinicians directly into doctors' offices to improve access to care for adolescents. Clinicians used standard questionnaires, the PHQ-9 and GAD-7 for patients over 12, and the PSC-17 for younger patients, to track symptom severity before and after each session. The analysis showed significant decreases in reported symptoms for three of the four measures used.
Specifically, the percentage of patients scoring high enough to indicate a problem decreased by 28.8% on the PHQ-9, 25.8% on the GAD-7, 16.5% on the PSC-17 attention subscale, and 17.3% on the PSC-17 internalizing subscale. However, the researchers found no significant change in scores on the PSC-17 externalizing subscale. Patients who started with higher symptom scores showed large improvements, and clinicians’ assessments of patient progress matched the changes patients reported on the questionnaires.
The researchers concluded that using questionnaires to monitor symptoms is a practical way to track how well mental health treatment is working for children.
