Do Consumer Providers Enhance Recovery?

Background/Rationale Serious mental illness (SMI) is the second most costly disorder treated
in the VHA, yet clinical outcomes for these patients are often poor due to a combination of
low quality care and severe cognitive and functional impairments. While these problems are
multifaceted, studies outside the VHA have shown that using "consumer providers" (CPs) can
improve and augment care. Similar to recovering addiction counselors, CPs are individuals
with SMI who use their lived experiences to provide services to others with SMI. CPs can
reach out to patients that are difficult to engage, assist patients with tasks of daily
living, offer a variety of rehabilitation (vocational, social, residential) services, be role
models and offer hope for recovery, and facilitate support groups. Randomized controlled and
quasi-experimental trials outside the VHA have shown that CPs can provide services that yield
at least equivalent patient outcomes with particular benefits noted on intensive case
management teams. VHA has hired about 250 CPs to date, although their impact has not been
documented. Yet its success outside the VHA and the recent emphasis on recovery-oriented care
suggests the need to test this model in the VHA.

Objectives To conduct a randomized controlled trial testing the impact on patient level and
team level outcomes of the implementation of CP services on six mental health intensive case
management (MHICM) teams in VISN-22. The specific aims were to: 1) Evaluate the
acceptability, facilitators of and barriers to the inclusion of two CPs to each intervention
MHICM team. 2) Evaluate the effect of including CPs on the degree to which MHICM teams
services are recovery-oriented. 3) Evaluate the effect of including CPs on veterans' clinical
and recovery-focused outcomes. Our hypotheses were that CPs would be feasible and acceptable,
that teams would become more recovery-oriented, and that the involvement of CPs would lead to
greater gains in recovery, quality of life, empowerment with regard to illness, and to a
lesser extent, symptoms compared to patients on teams without CPs.

Methods This project was a "cluster randomized controlled trial" comparing 3 CP-MHICM teams
(with CPs) to 3 control teams (i.e., without a CP), at MHICM sites within VISN-22. All
patients on the 6 MHICM teams' caseload during each site's recruitment period were eligible.
282 MHICM patients were enrolled, 149 at the intervention sites and 133 at the control sites.
Each intervention MHICM team used a strategic planning process to tailor the CP intervention
to local priorities and structures, involving multiple meetings to discuss the CP's role,
hiring, and incorporation of CPs into the team. The project hired the CPs, provided training,
assisted in their implementation on the teams and provided ongoing supervision. The CPs
worked for about 12 months.

Using a patient survey, the study assessed impacts of CPs on patient level outcomes including
recovery-orientation of their team (Recovery Self-assessment scale), individual recovery
(Mental Health Recovery Measure, Illness Self-Management Scale), quality of life (Quality of
Life Interview), symptoms (BASIS-24), and patient activation (Patient Activation Measure).
The patient level outcome assessments were conducted pre and post intervention. Final
follow-up assessment rates ranged from 71- 95% at intervention sites and 80 - 88% at control
sites.

We conducted site visits with all six MHICM teams using a validated, standardized protocol,
rating each team's level of recovery orientation before and after the deployment of the CPs
on the Recovery-Oriented Practices Index (ROPI). We conducted 23 focus groups and interviews
with patients, providers and CPs at all intervention sites (about 8 per site) at the post
time point to assess barriers and facilitators to CP implementation. All focus groups and
interviews were recorded, transcribed, and coded using Atlas.ti.

The analyses of the patient survey data were comparisons of changes between baseline and
followup scores with regression analyses of the change scores for all the outcomes mentioned
above. The first analyses was whether the intervention group was significantly related to
change considering only treatment group and statistically controlling for baseline score. The
second was the same as the first, adding demographics (age, gender, race, living situation
and education level) and site as fixed covariates. The ROPI ratings were made on a very small
number of units (6 teams), therefore the results were descriptive and involved a percent
change from pre to post. The focus groups and interviews were each summarized and then
summarized by site. The study team discussed the results. Using the constant comparison
method, salient topics were compared within and across roles and sites.

Status Completed. Major activities and accomplishments included hiring 6 CPs who together
logged over 2000 clinical encounters over the funding period of the project.

Inclusion Criteria:

- Patient must have a Serious Mental Illness;

- Patient must be working with a VA Intensive Case Management team

Exclusion Criteria:

- Prior exposure to intervention; Reduced capacity;

- Patient is no longer working with a VA Intensive Case Management