Evaluation capacity building in an integrative, psycho-educational PTSD treatment program

The need for evaluation capacity building (ECB) in in integrative medicine is apparent in light of the proliferation of newly developed, yet untested programs.  Patients seek evidence in order to make health care decisions. Program managers need data for decision-making about program expansion, remission, and replication. The Back on Track program is an integrative, psycho-educational PTSD program which had spearheaded evaluation efforts by collecting outcomes data as standard of care. The program staff is highly motivated for evaluation, but lack sufficient time for analysis or sustainability of evaluation efforts. The ECB activities that emerged as important for this program involved improving the existing evaluation system by retooling measures, adding a follow up assessment time point, creating an improved database that included data validation and automated summary statistics for on-going assessment once the professional evaluators finished the study. This talk presents the experience of applying an evaluation capacity building model to help address these deficiencies. The study utilized Preskill and Boyle’s multi-disciplinary model for capacity building as a guiding framework because it offers evaluation activities that can be tailored and sustained by programs.  The findings from this study will be useful for anyone looking to initiate or further develop their program’s evaluation systems.