by Riley McDanal, Stony Brook University
At a time when so many people struggle to access necessary care, single-session intervention approaches can connect such individuals with immediate, action-oriented support. In turn, these single-session interventions offer training clinicians experience with a variety of clientele and presenting problems, count toward clinical hours, require minimal supervision, and bring in extra income for the training clinic.
A brief consultation program can take a variety of forms, and many models exist. A recommended resource for those interested in single-session interventions can be found here; this guide documents examples of single-session interventions, discusses recent research and cultural considerations, and addresses administrative and implementation concerns. Single-session intervention approaches have shown feasibility, acceptability, and efficacy across a variety of populations and problem areas (Bloom, 2001; Hymmen et al., 2013; Perkins, 2006). One solution-focused program currently being implemented at Stony Brook University, New York University, and Phoenix Children’s Hospital is the Single-Session Consultation (SSC) program (Schleider et al., 2021; program materials are freely accessible at https://osf.io/xnz2t/). In this brief consultation program, clients on the psychotherapy waiting list are offered a one-time, action-oriented consultation session. Through a discussion with the clinician, they identify and document several feasible, concrete steps toward addressing their struggles, a process which generates an individualized action plan for take-home use. Preliminary evidence is promising: Early SSC clients at Stony Brook University reported high satisfaction (average rating of 4.12/5), significant reductions in hopelessness (p<0.001), and a significant increase in readiness to change (p=0.02) following their consultation. So far, more than 50% of clients offered a single-session consultation have accepted the offer, and more than 70% of those individuals completed their session. Some SSC clients even left the psychotherapy waitlist following their consultation, reporting that the SSC provided the support they needed for the time being.
Beyond the utility provided to clients, brief consultation programs also offer training clinicians a chance to gain exposure to more complex, unfamiliar, and/or diverse clientele and clinical issues. Similarly, single-session consultations can also be applied as a flexible therapeutic tool in contexts where “traditional” weekly psychotherapy is not feasible, such as in emergency departments, primary care, and schools. Jenna Sung, a clinician who uses the SSC program, reported that clinicians in training have used the SSC as an opportunity to meet new clientele and work with novel clinical issues without the commitment of a long-term therapeutic relationship. Through this exploration, trainees are better able to broaden their skills and expand their comfort zone. SSC sessions also count toward clinical hours and place minimal demands on clinical supervisors. Jenna reports that clients have been able to pay for their consultations through a sliding scale fee or through their insurance policy, meaning that the SSC brings in additional income to the clinic. With results backing the utility of brief consultation programs for all parties, it is clear that brief intervention approaches have much to offer to clinical training programs.________________________________________________________________
References
Bloom, B. L. (2001). Focused single‐session psychotherapy: a review of the clinical and research literature. Brief Treatment & Crisis Intervention, 1(1), 75-86.
Hymmen, P., Stalker, C. A., & Cait, C. A. (2013). The case for single-session therapy: Does the empirical evidence support the increased prevalence of this service delivery model? Journal of Mental Health, 22(1), 60-71.
Perkins, R. (2006). The effectiveness of one session of therapy using a single‐session therapy approach for children and adolescents with mental health problems. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 79(2), 215-227.
Schleider, J.L., Sung, J.Y., Bianco, A., Gonzalez, A., Vivian, D., & Mullarkey, M.C. (2021). Open pilot trial of a single-session consultation service for clients on psychotherapy waitlists. The Behavior Therapist, 44, 8-15.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this newsletter are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Psychological Clinical Science Accreditation System (PCSAS).