Conducting research through a community mental health center: A research team's experiences.

Abstract

This article shares the professional and personal experiences of a research team in conducting research through a community mental health center's research and evaluation department over a 5-year period. The team is unique in that it consists of center staff, university professors, and graduate students collaborating to do research through the center. In addition to meeting the various research and evaluation requirements of the center, the team successfully conducted research projects resulting in a continuing series of publications, convention presentations, and several dissertations and theses. The problems and rewards of this endeavor are offered from the perspective of the various research team members.This article shares the professional and personal experiences of a research team in conducting research through a community mental health center's (CMHC) research and evaluation department over a 5-year period. The somewhat unique team consisted of center staff, university professors, and graduate students who collaborated on the research projects. In addition to meeting the various research and evaluation requirements of the center, the team successfully conducted research projects in a number of interest areas (e.g., client's and therapist's treatment expectations, consumer satisfaction with mental health services, relationship of type of payment to course and outcome of treatment, community and gatekeeper awareness of mental health services, etc.) that resulted in a continuing series of published articles, convention presentations, and several dissertations and theses. The problems and rewards of this endeavor are shared from the perspective of the various research team members.In the first section, the director of the center's research and evaluation (R&E) department addresses the complexities of developing a research department in an action setting. The demands from inside and outside the agency are discussed, as are potential solutions to these pressures. The university-affiliated member then discusses his experiences in attempting to fulfill academic research requirements in combination with applied research interests and center needs and the perceived advantages and disadvantages of this endeavor. Next, a former research extern at the center, who ultimately conducted his doctoral research through the center's research and evaluation department, details the promises and pitfalls of this project from the doctoral student perspective. A staff member, later director of the R&E department, and a university student doing her thesis research conclude the article with their discussion of innovative ways of conducting large-scale community-based research with limited resources. The recruitment, training, and utilization of undergraduates to conduct community research are discussed.

Program evaluation training: A collaborative university-CMHC venture.

“…Recognizing that the conduct of program and outcome evaluation research is very different in design and implementation than most research conducted in academic settings (see Balch, Flynn, Ireland, Lewis, & Scott, 1980), the present authors decided that students might benefit from a course project that allowed them to gain direct experience in program evaluation research by conducting a clinical care study (National Institute of Mental Health, 1976) at a community mental health center (Dede Wallace Center, Nashville, Tennessee).…”

“…Unfortunately, the nature and extent of these and competing evaluation requirements are often beyond the existing-resources of a CMHC. Furthermore, at present, few CMHC clinical staff members are trained, knowledgeable, or actively involved in evaluation activities (e.g., Balch et al, 1980). Thus, when a CMHC can enter into a partnership with a university to help it perform some of its evaluation functions, both parties can benefit (see Balch et al, 1980).…”

“…However, cross appointments are not a sine qua non, and professionals at each agency could easily collaborate to mutually accomplish the same benefits for each of their respective agencies. What is necessary, however, is the active support of the administration or director of the CMHC (Balch et al, 1980;Morell, 1979). In the present case the director of the CMHC and the director of program evaluation (the second author) gave the venture their full support, including communicating to line staff that university graduate students would be conducting two clinical care studies for the CMHC and would need access to clients' charts and cooperation from staff if questions arose about notations in the charts.…”