Adoption and reach of behavioral health services for behavior problems in pediatric primary care

The field of implementation science provides the variables adoption and reach, which can be used to evaluate aspects to access, a primary incitement for integrated care. This study compared two integrated models: In Year 1, behavioral health consultants worked collaboratively with pediatricians to provide brief on-the-spot consultations to patients with behavioral concerns, and in Year 2, a structured, evidence-based treatment (EBT), the Family Check-Up, was developed to be delivered in conjunction with the existing collaborative model.

A chart review revealed the number of children who (a) attended a 4- to 5-year-old well-visit, (B) were screened, (c) were identified as having behavior problems, (d) were referred, and (e) accessed the services. Outcomes were calculated as percentages of children with behavioral concerns who were referred to (adoption) and received (reach) the services in each year.

Key findings were that (a) physician referrals increased when an EBT was added, but (b) patients had better first-session contact with the brief approach than the EBT, which few patients completed.

Results underscore the utility of measuring adoption and reach as partial indicators of access to services. These are accessible variables, collected in every practice that can be measured routinely in the context of quality improvement and, ideally, reported in studies as a way to disseminate knowledge about how to build behavioral health technology into primary care. Future research should strive for more rigor in measuring adoption and reach, and consider including a number of other implementation outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).