Data-gathering tools for "real world" clinical settings: a multisite feasibility study

Area of Science:

• Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
• Clinical Psychology
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Assessing child and family mental health needs in real-world clinical settings requires easily implementable data-gathering strategies.
• Existing methods may not be suitable for diverse clinical environments.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and pilot a clinician-friendly questionnaire for routine data collection in child mental health settings.
• To evaluate the feasibility and utility of standardized data gathering for understanding child mental health needs.

Main Methods:

• A questionnaire collecting demographic, psychosocial, medical, and family history data was developed.
• Optical scanning technology was used to encode data from over 1,900 children across military, civilian psychiatric, pediatric, and community samples.
• Data were collected from four military child psychiatry clinics, a civilian psychiatric state hospital, pediatric patients, and a community sample.

Main Results:

• Clinical data were reliably obtained across multiple geographic and logistic settings.
• Meaningful differences were identified across samples in presenting complaints and psychosocial/demographic variables.
• The collected data demonstrated high accuracy and completeness despite challenges.

Conclusions:

• Standardized data-gathering approaches are important and feasible in routine clinical settings.
• These tools offer opportunities and highlight potential hazards in research.
• The questionnaire shows significant merit and warrants further implementation and testing.