How treatment success could be assessed

Journal/Book: Psychother Res. 1995; 5: 72 Spring Street, New York, NY 10012. Guilford Press. 281-296.

Abstract: The political requirement of quality assurance has been extended to psychotherapy, making it necessary to define appropriate criteria of therapeutic success. Without a theoretical foundation, previous classifications of various dimensions of success measurement will remain non-obligatory. If ''healing or improvement of illness'' is chosen as a common therapeutic goal, measurement of success has to be done on several dimensions according to the general conception of disease in medicine. On the dimension ''causes and disease'' there is no alternative to school-specific measures. On the dimension of ''illness/symptoms,'' general symptom measures as well as disorder-specific measures are adequate. On the dimension of ''consequences/sickness,'' measures across the different schools and disorders based on the sick role and the impairment of normal role behavior are possible. The methodology of measuring success includes the operationalization of the several success variables, the design of data collection and the definition of success criteria. Detailed proposals regarding these criteria are presented, both for the assessment of the size and the significance of the change obtained as well as for the degree of goal attainment (clinical relevance). Finally, against this background, conclusions for an appropriate measurement of success are drawn.

Note: Article D Schulte, Ruhr Univ Bochum, Fak Psychol, Univ Str 150, D-44780 Bochum, Germany

Keyword(s): PSYCHOTHERAPY OUTCOME RESEARCH; TIME-SERIES DATA; CLINICAL-SIGNIFICANCE; META-ANALYSIS; GENERALIZATION MAP; ASSESSMENT DEVICES; CONCEPTUAL SCHEME; GOAL ATTAINMENT; BEHAVIOR; CHILD

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