title: Goal attainment scaling: A general method for evaluating comprehensive community mental health programs.
abstract: A mental health enterprise may be described by either (a) rather general philosophical total mental health goals, or (b) highly diverse and individualized patient-therapist goals. Goals a. have not provided a workable framework for program evaluation. This paper proposes that evaluation be done in the framework of goals b. by setting up, before treatment, a measurable scale for each patient-therapist goal, and specifying, for each patient, a transformation of his overall goal attainment into a standardized T-score. This method, together with random assignment of patients to treatment modes, was devised to permit comparison of treatment modes within a program, but it also provides a good basis for a judgmental evaluation of the total program.
authors.affiliation: Hennepin County Mental Health Center, Hennepin County General Hospital, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
authors.forename: T J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Kiresuk
authors.forename: R E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Sherman