From not knowing to doing: An interprofessional approach to clinician training in use of Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS) as a recovery-oriented outcome measure in a rural mental health service

Kate Furlanetto; Rajlaxmi Khopade; Vivek Phutane; Ravi Bhat; Paul Stolee

doi:10.1111/inm.13340

From not knowing to doing: An interprofessional approach to clinician training in use of Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS) as a recovery-oriented outcome measure in a rural mental health service

Int J Ment Health Nurs. 2024 Apr 29. doi: 10.1111/inm.13340. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Kate Furlanetto¹, Rajlaxmi Khopade¹, Vivek Phutane^{1

2}, Ravi Bhat^{1

2}, Paul Stolee³

Affiliations

¹ Goulburn Valley Health, Shepparton, Victoria, Australia.
² The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
³ School of Public Health Sciences, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

PMID: 38685694
DOI: 10.1111/inm.13340

Abstract

Outcome measurement and feedback are key to quality improvement in healthcare. Goal attainment scaling (GAS) is a tool that could be used to measure outcomes of mental health services delivering recovery-oriented care. The objective of this prospective study was to evaluate the effectiveness of tailored, interprofessional, multilevel and adaptable GAS training on clinician views, learning, competence, performance and confidence in the use of GAS. Thematic analysis of eight clinician participant views was done using the method proposed by Braun and Clarke (Thematic analysis: a practical guide to understanding and doing, 2022). Four main themes were generated: clinicians found that this type of training is useful, GAS influenced the way they thought about their roles in goal setting and recovery-oriented care and COVID-19 pandemic impacts. Furthermore, clinicians' skills to set scalable GAS goals with consumers and clinician confidence in using GAS improved. The results of this study show a positive impact of tailored, interprofessional, multilevel and adaptable training supporting development of clinician skills in the GAS process. The training design had a favourable effect on clinician views, learning, competence, performance and confidence of GAS as a recovery-oriented outcome measure. The approach to GAS training and use of GAS as a recovery-oriented outcome measure should be considered in response to mental health service reform.

Keywords: Goal Attainment Scaling; community mental health; interprofessional training; outcome measure.