Subject: Marriage and Family Therapy

Part 1

For part one of this week’s assignment, you will address four issues:

1. Forecast how EBP will be integrated into future clinical work.

2. Discuss possible ways to contribute to the MFT knowledge base as a clinician?

3. What did you learn from Clement (2013) that you could use to evaluate your future clinical work?

Clement, P. (2013). Practice-based evidence: 45 years of psychotherapy’s effectiveness in a private practice. http://proxy1.ncu.edu/login?://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?&&&-live

4. In light of the comments in the video from Barry Duncan, how might you obtain feedback from your clients to determine if you are on track?

Duncan, B. (2009, October 19). The good, the bad, and the ugly of psychotherapy: Practice based evidence to the rescue. https://youtu.be/bqdVx7ZoXao

Length: 450-500 words

Your response should reflect scholarly writing and current APA standards.

Part 2

For part two of this week’s assignment, you will reply to the following discussion. In your reply, please specify (a) one thing that was interesting to you or resonated with you from their post, and (b) provide the author of the post with at least one question or comment to consider.

“EBP will continue to be the means of support for treatment in clinical work. As America continues the restructure of its healthcare system, mental health care will be available to more people and more regulations will be applied to the practices, meaning treatments will need to be held to a higher standard. This standard will be EBP and it will need to be expanded through research funds and policies, in order to be able to enlarge the knowledge base. Access to EBP will also increase with more funding. Evidence based practice centers are being created with the help of government agencies to provide reviews and reports of EBP findings that are accessible by healthcare professionals. Other government funded initiatives for EBP include outlets for grading evidence for quality and strength and an outlet for training healthcare professionals on how to learn effective strategies for applying the research in clinical treatments. EBP will also become important for third-party payers. Insurance companies typically need concrete evidence that a treatment is working or WILL work for their insured. Supporting treatment and outcomes with EBP will be important for clinicians to provide to ensure that they are paid for their services and that their clients continue to receive the correct form and amount of care necessary. By increasing use of electronic medical records, clinicians can contribute to the MFT knowledge base. Learning how to properly use and enter medical records or treatment/progress notes into the records can possibly allow for EBP uses in the future (Williams, Et. al. 2014).

After reading Clement’s (2013) article on practice-based evidence, I learned that it is important to keep detailed records, including keeping track of cancellations and no-shows, in order to understand the effectiveness of my practice. Other data such as referrals, outcome rating scale measurements, sessions per case, and client statistical data are also important to record to learn if there is a correlation between these things and effectiveness of practice. I also learned that there are many factors that go into rating effectiveness. There are certain criteria that clinicians seemingly have no control over that influence their “effectiveness”, however, there are also ways to measure those same criteria in order to increase levels of effectiveness. Barry Duncan (2009) suggests collecting feedback from clients during the course of their treatment to measure efficacy and effectiveness of the treatment. Outcome rating scales and client/therapist alliance feedback can help raise the effectiveness of treatment with clients.

References

Clement, P. P. (2013). Practice-Based Evidence: 45 Years of Psychotherapy's Effectiveness in a Private Practice. American Journal Of Psychotherapy, 67(1), 23-46.

Duncan, B. (2009, October 19). The good, the bad, and the ugly of psychotherapy: Practice based evidence to the rescue. YouTube.

Williams, L., Patterson, J., & Edwards, T. M. (2014) Clinician’s guide to research methods in family therapy. The Guilford Press. New York. London.”

Length: 100-150 words

Your response should reflect scholarly writing and current APA standards.