Sustaining practice change one year after completion of the national depression management leadership initiative

This report describes the sustainability of quality improvement interventions for depression care in psychiatric practice one year after the completion of the National Depression Management Leadership Initiative (NDMLI) in 2006. The main intervention involved continued use of the nine-item depression scale of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) for routine care of patients with depressive disorders.

One year after project completion, lead psychiatrists from the 17 participating practices were surveyed about the sustainability of key practice interventions and dissemination of the interventions.

All 14 practices that provided baseline and follow-up data reported sustained use of the PHQ-9 for screening, diagnosis, or monitoring purposes. Moreover, practices reported dissemination of this approach to clinicians within and outside their practices.

Psychiatrists reported sustainability and dissemination of PHQ-9 use one year after the conclusion of the NDMLI. The model has potential as a depression care improvement strategy and is worthy of additional study.