Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study

BackgroundScreening Wizard (SW) is a technology-based decision support tool aimed at guiding primary care providers (PCPs) to respond to depression and suicidality screens in adolescents. Separate screens assess adolescents’ and parents’ reports on mental health symptoms, tre...

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Main Authors: Ana Radovic, Nathan Anderson, Megan Hamm, Brandie George-Milford, Carrie Fascetti, Stacey Engster, Oliver Lindhiem
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: JMIR Publications 2021-09-01
Series:JMIR Mental Health
Online Access:https://mental.jmir.org/2021/9/e26035
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author Ana Radovic
Nathan Anderson
Megan Hamm
Brandie George-Milford
Carrie Fascetti
Stacey Engster
Oliver Lindhiem
author_facet Ana Radovic
Nathan Anderson
Megan Hamm
Brandie George-Milford
Carrie Fascetti
Stacey Engster
Oliver Lindhiem
author_sort Ana Radovic
collection DOAJ
description BackgroundScreening Wizard (SW) is a technology-based decision support tool aimed at guiding primary care providers (PCPs) to respond to depression and suicidality screens in adolescents. Separate screens assess adolescents’ and parents’ reports on mental health symptoms, treatment preferences, and potential treatment barriers. A detailed summary is provided to PCPs, also identifying adolescent-parent discrepancies. The goal of SW is to enhance decision-making to increase the utilization of evidence-based treatments. ObjectiveThis qualitative study aims to describe multi-stakeholder perspectives of adolescents, parents, and providers to understand the potential barriers to the implementation of SW. MethodsWe interviewed 11 parents and 11 adolescents and conducted two focus groups with 18 health care providers (PCPs, nurses, therapists, and staff) across 2 pediatric practices. Participants described previous experiences with screening for depression and were shown a mock-up of SW and asked for feedback. Interviews and focus groups were transcribed verbatim, and codebooks were inductively developed based on content. Transcripts were double coded, and disagreements were adjudicated to full agreement. Completed coding was used to produce thematic analyses of the interviews and focus groups. ResultsWe identified five main themes across the interviews and focus groups: parents, adolescents, and pediatric PCPs agree that depression screening should occur in pediatric primary care; there is concern that accurate self-disclosure does not always occur during depression screening; SW is viewed as a tool that could facilitate depression screening and that might encourage more honesty in screening responses; parents, adolescents, and providers do not want SW to replace mental health discussions with providers; and providers want to maintain autonomy in treatment decisions. ConclusionsWe identified that providers, parents, and adolescents are all concerned with current screening practices, mainly regarding inaccurate self-disclosure. They recognized value in SW as a computerized tool that may elicit more honest responses and identify adolescent-parent discrepancies. Surprisingly, providers did not want the SW report to include treatment recommendations, and all groups did not want the SW report to replace conversations with the PCP about depression. Although SW was originally developed as a treatment decision algorithm, this qualitative study has led us to remove this component, and instead, SW focuses on aspects identified as most useful by all groups. We hope that this initial qualitative work will improve the future implementation of SW.
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spelling doaj.art-2828c73d59a24557909bf4d9a1d1dea32023-08-28T19:04:09ZengJMIR PublicationsJMIR Mental Health2368-79592021-09-0189e2603510.2196/26035Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview StudyAna Radovichttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-4022-4151Nathan Andersonhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-5035-1402Megan Hammhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-7842-5290Brandie George-Milfordhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-7896-3697Carrie Fascettihttps://orcid.org/0000-0001-7791-0641Stacey Engsterhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-5622-9387Oliver Lindhiemhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-1012-9102 BackgroundScreening Wizard (SW) is a technology-based decision support tool aimed at guiding primary care providers (PCPs) to respond to depression and suicidality screens in adolescents. Separate screens assess adolescents’ and parents’ reports on mental health symptoms, treatment preferences, and potential treatment barriers. A detailed summary is provided to PCPs, also identifying adolescent-parent discrepancies. The goal of SW is to enhance decision-making to increase the utilization of evidence-based treatments. ObjectiveThis qualitative study aims to describe multi-stakeholder perspectives of adolescents, parents, and providers to understand the potential barriers to the implementation of SW. MethodsWe interviewed 11 parents and 11 adolescents and conducted two focus groups with 18 health care providers (PCPs, nurses, therapists, and staff) across 2 pediatric practices. Participants described previous experiences with screening for depression and were shown a mock-up of SW and asked for feedback. Interviews and focus groups were transcribed verbatim, and codebooks were inductively developed based on content. Transcripts were double coded, and disagreements were adjudicated to full agreement. Completed coding was used to produce thematic analyses of the interviews and focus groups. ResultsWe identified five main themes across the interviews and focus groups: parents, adolescents, and pediatric PCPs agree that depression screening should occur in pediatric primary care; there is concern that accurate self-disclosure does not always occur during depression screening; SW is viewed as a tool that could facilitate depression screening and that might encourage more honesty in screening responses; parents, adolescents, and providers do not want SW to replace mental health discussions with providers; and providers want to maintain autonomy in treatment decisions. ConclusionsWe identified that providers, parents, and adolescents are all concerned with current screening practices, mainly regarding inaccurate self-disclosure. They recognized value in SW as a computerized tool that may elicit more honest responses and identify adolescent-parent discrepancies. Surprisingly, providers did not want the SW report to include treatment recommendations, and all groups did not want the SW report to replace conversations with the PCP about depression. Although SW was originally developed as a treatment decision algorithm, this qualitative study has led us to remove this component, and instead, SW focuses on aspects identified as most useful by all groups. We hope that this initial qualitative work will improve the future implementation of SW.https://mental.jmir.org/2021/9/e26035
spellingShingle Ana Radovic
Nathan Anderson
Megan Hamm
Brandie George-Milford
Carrie Fascetti
Stacey Engster
Oliver Lindhiem
Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
JMIR Mental Health
title Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
title_full Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
title_fullStr Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
title_full_unstemmed Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
title_short Perceived Facilitators of and Barriers to Implementation of a Decision Support Tool for Adolescent Depression and Suicidality Screening: Focus Group and Interview Study
title_sort perceived facilitators of and barriers to implementation of a decision support tool for adolescent depression and suicidality screening focus group and interview study
url https://mental.jmir.org/2021/9/e26035
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