Behavioral Health Factors as Predictors of Emergency Department Use in the High-Risk, High-Cost Medicare Population.

Objective: This study measured the presence, extent, and type of behavioral health factors in a high-cost Medicare population and their association with the probability and intensity of emergency department (ED) use.

Methods: Retrospective claims analysis and a comprehensive electronic medical record-based review were conducted for patients enrolled in a 65-month prospective care management program at an academic tertiary medical center (N=3,620). A two-part model used multivariable logistic regression to evaluate the effect of behavioral health factors on the probability of ED use, complemented by a Poisson model to measure the number of ED visits.

Teaching the teachers: a model course for psychodynamic psychotherapy supervisors.

Objective: There are no standard training programs for teaching psychotherapy supervisors effective, ethical, and legal aspects of supervision. This article describes an eight session training course containing essential information for supervisors.

Methods: The literature on psychotherapy supervision was reviewed and an evening seminar series was offered to veteran supervisor.

Predicting length of stay on an acute care medical psychiatric inpatient service.

The goal of this study was to identify variables associated with length of stay (LOS) and to incorporate into the authors' routine preadmission assessment the measurement of these variables. A retrospective study of 80 discharged patients explored the association of 25 variables reflecting a mixture of patient/demographic variables, illness variables, and treatment variables with LOS. Multivariate analysis revealed that 10 variables independently accounted for 62% of the variance in LOS.