WEB-BASED DISSEMINATION TOOL FOR COMMUNITY MENTAL HEALTH

NIMH
ID: 2R44MH086983-03
PI: JANEY MCMILLEN
TERM: 09/12 – 05/16

Over the past several decades, a large number of mental health (MH) practices and interventions have been rigorously tested through randomized control trials and shown efficacious. However, despite availability, evidence-based interventions (EBIs) are rarely adopted in everyday practice within community MH service settings. Further, even when adopted, MH EBIs are seldom implemented with strong adherence to the original design and often fail to be sustained over time. A growing body of literature demonstrates how implementation quality is directly related to the likelihood an EBI will be embedded into everyday clinical practice as well as the likelihood that EBI achieves its intended treatment outcomes. As outlined in NIMH’s Strategic Plan, innovative methods to help close the gap between development of research-tested interventions and their widespread use are critically needed.

This Phase II SBIR project will continue research and development of the Web-Based Dissemination Tool for Community Mental Health (WDT-C), a flexible technology infrastructure specifically designed to foster quality implementation of MH EBIs within community MH service settings on a broad scale. WDT-C will offer a suite of customizable online tools and services, including cost-efficient high quality training and supervision resources, ongoing implementation assistance for providers, adherence monitoring, and outcomes tracking. Prototype development and feasibility testing with key stakeholders were successfully completed in Phase I, providing substantial support for the product as well as specific recommendations for Phase II development.

Three specific aims will be accomplished through this Phase II project. The first aim is to develop the full technology infrastructure utilizing Phase I feedback, and apply it to a third, independent MH EBI. To ensure maximal quality and make any needed adjustments prior to product testing, usability of this new WDT-C application will be assessed by community MH administrators and providers. The second aim is to conduct a scientific evaluation of WDT-C. Each of the three WDT-C supported EBIs will be implemented by community MH providers randomly assigned to either Implementation-As-Usual (no WDT-C support) or Enhanced Implementation (WDT-C supported implementation) conditions. Differences between conditions will be tested in five implementation outcome areas: (a) organizational readiness for intervention implementation, (b) adherence to intervention protocol, (c) satisfaction with intervention and implementation support, (d) sustainability of intervention, and (e) treatment benefits. The final aim is to finalize all product components based on Phase II findings and evaluations in preparation for Phase III commercialization. This SBIR project will yield a flexible, scalable technology infrastructure that can be applied to any community MH EBI to effectively decrease costs (time, financial, personnel) to both providers and intervention developers, enhance the quality with which EBIs are implemented in community settings, and increase dissemination of EBIs into “real world” everyday practice. More information about Centervention can be found at www.centervention.org.

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NIMH ID: 2R44MH086983-03 PI: JANEY MCMILLEN TERM: 09/12 – 05/16 Over the past several decades, a large number of mental health (MH) practices and interventions have been rigorously tested through randomized control trials and shown efficacious. However, despite availability, evidence-based interventions (EBIs) are rarely adopted in everyday practice within community MH service settings. Further, even when adopted, MH EBIs are seldom implemented with strong adherence to the original design and often fail to be sustained over time. A growing body of literature demonstrates how implementation quality is directly related to the likelihood an EBI will be embedded into everyday clinical practice as well as the likelihood that EBI achieves its intended treatment outcomes. As outlined in NIMH’s Strategic Plan, innovative methods to help close the gap between development of research-tested interventions and their widespread use are critically needed. This Phase II SBIR project will continue research and development of the Web-Based Dissemination Tool for Community Mental Health (WDT-C), a flexible technology infrastructure specifically designed to foster quality implementation of MH EBIs within community MH service settings on a broad scale. WDT-C will offer a suite of customizable online tools and services, including cost-efficient high quality training and supervision resources, ongoing implementation assistance for providers, adherence monitoring, and outcomes tracking. Prototype development and feasibility testing with key stakeholders were successfully completed in Phase I, providing substantial support for the product as well as specific recommendations for Phase II development. Three specific aims will be accomplished through this Phase II project. The first aim is to develop the full technology infrastructure utilizing Phase I feedback, and apply it to a third, independent MH EBI. To ensure maximal quality and make any needed adjustments prior to product testing, usability of this new WDT-C application will be assessed by community MH administrators and providers. The second aim is to conduct a scientific evaluation of WDT-C. Each of the three WDT-C supported EBIs will be implemented by community MH providers randomly assigned to either Implementation-As-Usual (no WDT-C support) or Enhanced Implementation (WDT-C supported implementation) conditions. Differences between conditions will be tested in five implementation outcome areas: (a) organizational readiness for intervention implementation, (b) adherence to intervention protocol, (c) satisfaction with intervention and implementation support, (d) sustainability of intervention, and (e) treatment benefits. The final aim is to finalize all product components based on Phase II findings and evaluations in preparation for Phase III commercialization. This SBIR project will yield a flexible, scalable technology infrastructure that can be applied to any community MH EBI to effectively decrease costs (time, financial, personnel) to both providers and intervention developers, enhance the quality with which EBIs are implemented in community settings, and increase dissemination of EBIs into “real world” everyday practice. More information about Centervention can be found at www.centervention.org.
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DEB CHILDRESS, PHD

Chief of Research and Learning Content

BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Childress obtained her PhD in psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to coming to 3C Institute, she served as a research associate and a postdoctoral fellow in the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill working on a longitudinal imaging study aimed at identifying the early markers of autism through behavioral and imaging methodologies. She has 19 years of autism research experience, during which she has examined the behavioral, personality, and cognitive characteristics of individuals with autism and their family members. Dr. Childress also has experience developing behavioral and parent report measurement tools, coordinating multi-site research studies, and collecting data from children and families. She has taught courses and seminars in general child development, autism, and cognitive development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Expertise

  • autism
  • early development
  • behavioral measurement
  • integrating behavioral and biological measurement

Education

  • Postdoctoral fellowship, Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities (Institutional NRSA-NICHD), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
  • PhD, developmental psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
  • BS, psychology (minor in sociology), University of Iowa

Selected Publications

  • Elison, J. T., Wolff, J. J., Heimer, D. C., Paterson, S. J., Gu, H., Hazlett, H. C., Styner, M, Gerig, G., & Piven, J. (in press). Frontolimbic neural circuitry at 6 months predicts individual differences in joint attention at 9 months. Developmental Science.
  • Wassink, T. H., Vieland, V. J., Sheffield, V. C., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., Childress, D. & Piven, J. (2008). Posterior probability of linkage analysis of autism dataset identifies linkage to chromosome 16. Psychiatric Genetics,18(2),85-91.
  • Losh, M., Childress, D., Lam K. & Piven, J. (2008). Defining key features of the broad autism phenotype: A comparison across parents of multiple- and single-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 147B(4):424-33.
  • Wassink, T. H., Piven, J., Vieland, V. J., Jenkins, L., Frantz R., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., … Sheffield, V.C. (2005). Evaluation of the chromosome 2q37.3 gene CENTG2 as an autism susceptibility gene. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 136, 36-44.
  • Barrett, S., Beck, J., Bernier, R., Bisson, E., Braun, T., Casavant, T., Childress, D., … Vieland, V. (1999). An autosomal genomic screen for autism. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 88, 609-615. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1096-8628(19991215)88:63.0.CO;2-L
  • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Landa, R., Santangelo, S., Jacobi, D. & Childress, D. (1997). Personality and language characteristics in parents from multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 74, 398-411.
  • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Jacobi, D., Childress, D. & Arndt, S. (1997). Broader autism phenotype: Evidence from a family history study of multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Psychiatry, 154, 185-190.