A school-based post-Katrina therapeutic intervention.

The current study presents the implementation of a set of school based interventions in a greater New Orleans school district one year following Hurricane Katrina. The interventions included adaptation and implementation of evidence based treatments in a crisis situation with at-risk youth which involved training and clinical challenges. 386 students found to have significant depressive and/or disruptive disorder symptoms received treatment from the School Therapeutic Enhancement Program (STEP).

What is the evidence for evidence-based treatments? A hard look at our soft underbelly.

In the rising quest for evidence-based interventions, recent research often does not give adequate attention to "nonspecific therapeutic factors," including the effects of attention, positive regard, and therapeutic alliance, as well as the effects of treatment dose, intensity and actual processes mediating therapeutic change. To determine the extent to which recent clinical trial designs fully this problem, the authors conducted a systematic review of Psych-Lit/Medline of all controlled child psychotherapy treatment studies from 1995 to 2004. A total of 52 studies were identified that met review criteria: two or more therapy conditions and random assignment of participants to intervention groups.