POPULATION-BASED GUIDELINES FOR PERFORMANCE-MEASUREMENT - A PRELIMINARY-REPORT

This paper describes the development of-and early efforts to validate- guidelines that indicate average amounts of service expected to be use d by a population of patients with a given disorder who are served by a comprehensive mental health system. These guidelines address expecte d service use by individuals in 55 diagnostic groups. The purpose of t hese guidelines is to provide a gauge for evaluating the amounts of se rvice being delivered by managed care organizations. Three population- based guidelines (for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, major depressive disorder, and schizophrenia) are compared to actual amounts of service delivered to enrollees in large behavioral health care sys tems.