Predictors of rate of change for children and youth with emotional disorders: a naturalistic observational study.

BACKGROUND: To examine demographic and clinical characteristics as potential predictors of change for children and youth with emotional disorders treated at two child and adolescent mental health outpatient services (CAMHS) in Norway. METHODS: The study was of naturalistic observational type with "treatment as usual" (TAU). The sample consisted of 84 children and youth with emotional disorders. The Health of the Nation Outcome Scale (HONOSCA), and the Children's Global Assessment Scale (CGAS) were administered at intake (T0), during the assessment (T1) and approximately six months after assessment (T2). Change was analysed by means of the linear mixed models procedure. RESULTS: For the HONOSCA total score, youths with a diagnosis of depression had statistically higher symptom severity levels at baseline and significantly lower change rates as compared to youths with an anxiety disorder. CONCLUSIONS: The current study adds to the limited knowledge of predictors of rate of change for children and adolescents with emotional disorders treated within CAMHS. Our results point to a special need to improve clinical care for depressed children and adolescents. Important limitations comprising the external validity of the study concern missing data, a small study sample, and lack of information regarding the content and extent of the service provided.

Evaluating change in symptomatic and functional level of children and youth with emotional disorders: a naturalistic observation study.

The objective of the study is to describe the changes in symptomatic and functional impairment for children and youth with emotional disorders treated at child and adolescent mental health outpatient services (CAMHS) in Norway. The study was of naturalistic observational type in which the treatment can be classified as "treatment as usual" (TAU). The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ), the Health of the Nation Outcome Scale (HONOSCA) and the Children's Global Assessment Scale (CGAS) were used as measures of change. The information from multiple informants allowed the evaluation of change from different perspectives. The sample consisted of 84 children and youth with emotional disorders treated at two CAMHS in the North of Norway. The SDQ, the HONOSCA and the CGAS were administered at intake (T0), during assessment (T1) and approximately, 6 months after T1 (T2). Change was analysed by means of the Linear Mixed Models procedure. The results show that children and youth with emotional disorders experience a statistically significant improvement per month during outpatient treatment according to nearly all the measures of change. For the clinician rated scores, change rates during active assessment/treatment were larger than during the waitlist period. Evaluating change from the perspective of clinical significance showed that only a small proportion of the subjects had change scores that were statistically reliable and clinically significant. Whether an actual change has occurred is uncertain for the majority of patients.

Predictors and moderators of outcome in child and adolescent anxiety and depression: a systematic review of psychological treatment studies.

The aim of this literature review was to examine pre-treatment child and adolescent characteristics as predictors and moderators of outcome in psychotherapy treatment trials of anxiety and depressive disorders. A literature search was conducted using several databases and resulted in 45 published studies (32 anxiety studies and 13 depression studies) meeting predefined methodological criteria. Ten client demographic (age, gender, ethnicity, IQ) and clinical factors (duration, type of diagnosis, pre-treatment severity, comorbidity) were examined across studies. The majority of findings showed non-significant associations between demographic factors (gender and age) with treatment outcome for both the anxiety and the depression treatment trials. Some important differences between the results of the anxiety and depression treatment trials were found. The majority of findings for the anxiety studies suggest that there are no demographic or clinical factors that predict or moderate treatment outcome. For the depression studies, however, the findings suggest that baseline symptom severity and comorbid anxiety may impact on treatment response. Overall, existing studies of pre-treatment patient variables as predictors and moderators of anxiety and depression treatment outcome provide little consistent knowledge concerning for what type of patients and under what conditions treatments work. Suggestions for future research are discussed.