A Randomized Clinical Trial
JAMA Psychiatry June 9, 2021
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Key Points
Question Can assigning patients to therapists with empirically determined strengths in treating the patients’ specific mental health problem(s) (ie, measurement-based matching) improve the outcomes of naturalistic psychotherapy compared with case assignment as usual?
Findings In this 2-arm, double-blind randomized clinical trial including 48 therapists and 218 outpatients, measurement-based matching promoted significantly greater reductions in patients’ general symptomatic and functional impairment, global psychological distress, and domain-specific impairment on patients’ most elevated presenting problem over 16 weeks postintake.
Meaning In this study, mental health care was enhanced by prospectively assigning patients to empirically good-fitting therapists, which requires minimal disruptions within a mental health care system.