Evaluation of Outpatient Treatment Program on 20 Mental Health Dimensions.

As a component of a consulting engagement with a Midwestern comprehensive mental health center, an Outpatient Assessment Questionnaire (OAQ) was administered pre-post to 124 outpatient clients in a three month time series design. These comparisons yielded significant changes on thirteen of the twenty dimensions, including general affect, positive affect, negative affect, anger, depression, coping via escape methods, level of functioning, mental coping methods, mental health, psychosis, seek professional help, spouse perception, and stress perception. Results show the greatest amount of improvement on the scales that measure emotional dimensions (affect, negative and positive affect, anger, and depression). Since most of the clients had presented complaints of depression and stress-related emotional problems, it appears that therapy over the course of six weeks had its greatest effect on the kinds of problems these clients were experiencing. In addition, clients showed improvement in the use of mental methods of coping with stress and tended not to escape as much as a means of coping. Their level of daily functioning improved slightly and they reported fewer symptoms of mental health distress, personal stress, and psychotic symptoms. There was a slight improvement in perception of their spouses. At the end of therapy, they were more likely to seek professional help. No changes were observed on the seven psycho-social dimensions. (MKA)