Quality in Psychological Therapies
KCA's PTP service uses
- an in-house system to manage referral levels and waiting times,
- the CORE (Clinical Outcomes in Routine Evaluations) system to evaluate practice in Psychological Therapies, and
- a client questionnaire to measure client satisfaction with the service.
At point of referral, clients are allocated a unique number and their details logged on a database.
This enables referral levels and waiting times to be monitored and reported on as well as patient profiles (e.g. age and gender of referrals, numbers of referrals from individual GPs). Individual appointments are also logged on this system.
Information from the database is used as part of the discussion in both line management and supervision.
All clients receiving group or individual input are assessed using the CORE Therapy Assessment Form and are asked to complete a CORE Outcome Measure.
A CORE End of Therapy form is completed for all clients; clients who come to a planned ending complete a second Outcome Measure.
CORE data is analysed using CORE PC and the reports produced outline referral patterns and outcome data.
Using CORE enables KCA to benchmark, anonymously, against other providers.
Finally, client satisfaction is monitored using a client questionnaire, which is sent out to clients (with their agreement) three months after therapy has finished.