The Growing Evidence for IOPs and PHPs
By Marissa Marcus, Psychology Assistant, Bradley Hospital
As a psychology assistant for Bradley Hospital’s intensive adolescent programming, my job is to gather data on patients’ outcomes and experiences in this level of care. In this role, I get to see for myself the impact that this level of care has on the teenagers that we treat. It’s a privilege to talk to teens and families on their first, nerve-wracking day and then again on their final, bittersweet day of “goodbyes” several weeks later. I experience firsthand how our clients learn and change in our teams’ care.
All these first-hand accounts of experiences with intensive treatment help us to build a qualitative and then statistical picture of our programs’ efficacy, contributing to the emerging evidence base on intensive treatment programs for mental health, both virtually and in-person. They also help us to tailor and continuously improve what we do.
Intensive outpatient programs (IOPs) and partial hospitalization programs (PHPs) are crucial pieces in the overall continuum of care in mental health. They can work as a “step up” for clients who are struggling with just weekly outpatient appointments, or as a “step down” for clients who no longer need inpatient treatment but still require a lot of support.
Today’s mental health specialists endorse the “balanced care model”. In this framework, both higher and lower levels of care are utilized in tandem with the guiding principle that patient autonomy is maintained, and treatment takes place in the context of everyday life and the home environment. More restrictive inpatient, or higher-level services are to be utilized only when necessary for the safety of the individual and others. Intensive programs are more comprehensive than weekly outpatient care but allow for the development of coping skills within the community environment.
Recently our team researched comparative outcomes for clients referred into our programs from the community (step up) and from inpatient care (step down) to see if there are differences. What we found is really exciting. We saw that clients demonstrate significant improvement in terms of interpersonal and intrapersonal (depression, anxiety, hopelessness etc) distress. They also experience a significant reduction in self-injurious behaviors and suicidal ideation during the course of treatment. This is true whether a patient is admitted from a higher or lower level of care. It’s also true in both our virtual and our in-person programs. Alleviation of serious mental health symptoms is not just possible, but statistically likely with this type of intensive, team-based treatment.
At a time of national crisis in adolescent mental health, this emerging evidence about treatment programs that work provides a glimmer of optimism that there are things we can do to help teens and their families. With resources and high-quality care, things can get better.
I’ll be presenting these findings in more detail on August 5th at the American Psychological Association Annual conference.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
Marissa Marcus
Psychology Assistant, Bradley Hospital
