Predicting patterns of service utilization within children's mental health agencies.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Some children with mental health (MH) problems have been found to receive ongoing care, either continuously or episodically. We sought to replicate patterns of MH service use over extended time periods, and test predictors of these patterns.

Methods

Latent class analyses were applied to 4 years of visit data from five MH agencies and nearly 6000 children, 4- to 13-years-old at their first visit.

Results

Five patterns of service use were identified, replicating previous findings. Overall, 14% of cases had two or more episodes of care and 23% were involved for more than 2 years. Most children (53%) were seen for just a few visits within a few months. Two patterns represented cases with two or more episodes of care spanning multiple years. In the two remaining

SUBMITTER: Reid GJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6929287 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature