title: The Met Needs Index: a new metric for outcome assessment in mental health services.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  No apt method has been available to assess and monitor the responsiveness of services in meeting ongoing needs of patients with long-term mental illness. The present study examines the utility of a new metric for such a purpose, the Met Needs Index (MNI), applied to the Camberwell Assessment of Need (CAN).
  
  
  METHODS
  The MNI was estimated as an aggregated measure of met need or beneficial outcome, based on annual staff rated CAN-assessments of 321 outpatients (76% psychotic disorders) in psychiatric care during 7 years. Corresponding confidence intervals were estimated with the bootstrap percentile method.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The overall MNI was estimated at 0.71 (95% CI 0.69-0.74), indicating that identified needs in general were met during 71% of the intervals between the annual assessments. However, the MNI for specific need domains of the CAN ranged from 0.89 (95% CI 0.84-0.93) for 'food' to 0.11 (95% CI 0.07-0.16) for 'sexual expression', indicating a significant variation in responsiveness of services to different types of need in this patient population.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The MNI seems to be a useful and powerful metric for outcome assessment and monitoring of psychiatric services from a needs assessment approach.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuroscience, Psychiatry, Uppsala University Hospital, 750 17, Uppsala, Sweden. erik.wennstrom@neuro.uu.se
authors.forename: Erik
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Wennström
authors.forename: Lars
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Berglund
authors.forename: Johan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lindbäck
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003156:Community Mental Health Services / Q000592:standards*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy*; D008875:Middle Aged; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000628:therapy; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013548:Sweden / Q000453:epidemiology