Validating Adolescent SBIRT Measures
Condition: Substance Abuse
MeSH terms: Substance-Related Disorders
Study type: Observational

Summary: 
      The purpose of this study is to address the needs for efficient and informative measurement
      for evaluating adolescent Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT)
      strategies. The investigators will undertake a longitudinal cohort study to build and
      validate a substance specific measurement battery that includes patient-centered and
      intermediary outcomes which can be integrated into a range of healthcare and research
      settings. The results of this project will enable evaluation of SBIRT trials and clinical
      efforts by validating a parsimonious set of measurement tools that can be incorporated into
      electronic health records. The primary goal of the proposed project is to develop a set of
      brief, valid tools that will allow both researchers and clinicians to collect information
      that enables evaluating and refining brief interventions.

      The main objective is to define and disseminate a set of brief and easy to administer
      measures that accurately detect 1) substance use frequency, 2) substance-specific patient
      centered outcomes and 3) intermediate measures of impact of adolescent SBIRT. The specific
      aim addressed in this project is to develop and administer an assessment battery that
      includes novel questions assessing substance use to be validated against criterion standard
      measures both cross-sectionally and longitudinally.
    

Detailed description: 
      A policy level mandate now exists to deliver screening, brief intervention, and referral to
      treatment (SBIRT) to all adolescents in primary care. This mandate is spurred by the
      imperative to reduce the enormous and preventable morbidity and mortality caused by
      adolescent substance use. Despite this mandate and the opportunity to reach large cohorts of
      youth early within primary and specialty pediatric care, SBIRT is not routinely delivered nor
      used in ways that optimize outcomes. The National Institute on Drug Abuse, National Institute
      on Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse, the Substance Use and Mental Health Services Administration
      and the Hilton Foundation have all included adolescent SBIRT in their research, training and
      service project portfolios. Lacking validated measures that can be used to assess impacts and
      guide early action, opportunities to glean the most effective strategies and components of
      brief interventions are hampered despite these considerable investments. This threatens the
      relevance and sustainability of this work.

      To address the needs for efficient and informative measurement for evaluating adolescent
      Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) strategies, the
      investigators will undertake a longitudinal cohort study to build and validate a substance
      specific measurement battery that includes patient-centered and intermediary outcomes which
      can be integrated into a range of healthcare and research settings. This is a construct
      validity study in which the investigators will be interested in seeing whether a brief set of
      questions will accurately measure substance use when compared to lengthy gold standard
      measures. This is also a predictive validity study, in which the investigators are interested
      in seeing whether proposed patient-centered and intermediary outcomes are relevant in
      predicting future substance use risk or patterns of use. The results of this project will
      enable evaluation of SBIRT trials and clinical efforts by validating a parsimonious set of
      measurement tools that can be incorporated into electronic health records.

      This project is one component of a two part study in which the investigators will enroll a
      total of 900 adolescents. The investigators will enroll a total of 450 participants from the
      Adolescent/Young Adult Medical Clinic for this study and will attempt to follow participant
      for one year. Accounting for attrition at 6 months and 12 months follow-up, the investigators
      expect 300 participants will complete the entire study.
    

Observational model: Cohort
Time perspective: Cross-Sectional
Sampling method: Non-Probability Sample
Study population: 
        Adolescent, ages 14-17, receiving care at the Adolescent/Young Adult Medicine Clinic at
        Boston Children's Hospital