Review: Comprehensive treatments for youth comorbidity – evidence‐guided approaches to a complicated problem
Year: 2015
Type: review
Abstract: BACKGROUND: Evidence-based treatments (EBTs) with a single-disorder focus have improved the potential for youth mental health care, yet may be an imperfect fit to clinical care settings where diagnostic comorbidity and co-occurring problems are commonplace. Most EBTs were developed to treat one diagnosis or problem (or a small homogenous cluster), but most clinically referred youths present with multiple disorders and problems. FINDINGS: Three emerging approaches may help address the comorbidity that is so common in treated youths. Conceptually unified treatments target presumed causal and maintaining factors that are shared among more than one disorder or problem area; preliminary open trials and case studies show promising results. Modular protocols combine the 'practice elements' that commonly appear in separate single-disorder EBTs and repackage them into coordinated delivery systems; one modular protocol, MATCH, has produced positive findings in a randomized effectiveness trial. Monitoring and Feedback Systems (MFSs) provide real-time data on client progress to inform clinical decision-making, encompassing comorbid and co-occurring problems; one study shows beneficial effects in everyday practice with diverse youth problems. CONCLUSIONS: All three approaches - conceptually unified, modular, and MFS - can be strengthened by increased research attention to treatment integrity, clinician user-appeal, design simplicity, and the infrastructure necessary for successful implementation.
DOI: 10.1111/camh.12092
Authors: Sarah Kate Bearman, John R. Weisz
Institutions: The University of Texas at Austin, Harvard University
Language: English
Subfield: Clinical Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
Awards: Behavioral and Affective Skills in Coping: Practice-Adapted Child Psychotherapy, Practice Based Evidence: Enhancing the Evidence Base for Adolescent Depression, Video Guided School Based Treatment of Youth Depression, G5362229494, Practice Based Evidence: Enhancing the Evidence Base for Adolescent Depression, COMMUNITY CLINIC TEST OF YOUTH ANXIETY TREATMENT
OpenAlex ID: W2013294621