Abstract
To improve methods of estimating use of evidence-based psychotherapy for posttraumatic stress disorder in the Veteran’s health
administration, we evaluated administrative data and note text for patients newly enrolling in six VHA outpatient PTSD clinics
in New England during the 2010 fiscal year (n = 1,924). Using natural language processing, we developed machine learning algorithms that mimic human raters in classifying
note text. We met our targets for algorithm performance as measured by precision, recall, and F-measure. We found that 6.3 %
of our study population received at least one session of evidence-based psychotherapy during the initial 6 months of treatment.
Evidence-based psychotherapies appear to be infrequently utilized in VHA outpatient PTSD clinics in New England. Our method
could support efforts to improve use of these treatments.
administration, we evaluated administrative data and note text for patients newly enrolling in six VHA outpatient PTSD clinics
in New England during the 2010 fiscal year (n = 1,924). Using natural language processing, we developed machine learning algorithms that mimic human raters in classifying
note text. We met our targets for algorithm performance as measured by precision, recall, and F-measure. We found that 6.3 %
of our study population received at least one session of evidence-based psychotherapy during the initial 6 months of treatment.
Evidence-based psychotherapies appear to be infrequently utilized in VHA outpatient PTSD clinics in New England. Our method
could support efforts to improve use of these treatments.
- Content Type Journal Article
- Category Original Article
- Pages 1-8
- DOI 10.1007/s10488-012-0421-0
- Authors
- Brian Shiner, VA Medical Center, White River Junction, VT, USA
- Leonard W. D’Avolio, VA Boston Health Care System, Jamaica Plain, MA, USA
- Thien M. Nguyen, VA Boston Health Care System, Jamaica Plain, MA, USA
- Maha H. Zayed, VA Medical Center, White River Junction, VT, USA
- Yinong Young-Xu, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, Hanover, NH, USA
- Rani A. Desai, VA National Center for PTSD, White River Junction, VT, USA
- Paula P. Schnurr, VA National Center for PTSD, White River Junction, VT, USA
- Louis D. Fiore, VA Boston Health Care System, Jamaica Plain, MA, USA
- Bradley V. Watts, VA Medical Center, White River Junction, VT, USA
- Journal Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research
- Online ISSN 1573-3289
- Print ISSN 0894-587X