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To give our readers a better sense of what an effective mental health treatment plan looks like, I have been recreating a treatment plan here through a series of blog posts. To see other posts in the Mental Health Treatment Plan series, please click here.

In our book, Therapy Revolution, I strongly advocate for the use of mental health treatment plans for all therapy patients/clients. One therapist commented, saying that using a treatment plan during therapy was “rigid” and “unsophisticated” and that she liked to “go with the flow.”  She was emphatic—a treatment plan “constrained her creativity as a therapist.”

But therapy is not about the therapist.  It is about helping patients.  And, as we mentioned before, the greatest creativity is actually supported by structure, such as the Sonnet, Haiku, the use of the musical scale and chords, the mathematical rules, the rules of basketball, and so on.

The majority of researchers, therapists and patients that we interviewed say that the use of a treatment plan makes for more effective therapy. It is also a fact that every inpatient and outpatient mental health program and addiction treatment program creates a treatment plan for each and every patient—because it helps focus treatment and improve successful outcomes. Also,  insurance companies require treatment plans for reimbursements. I believe only a handful of therapists in private practice have challenged the use of a treatment plan, even though many of them write plans during their day jobs in clinics.

Writing an effective treatment plan is hard work. It takes time and effort. It takes great thought, as well. But there is a concept known as “the longer-shorter path” that illustrates the reasons for investing effort in creating a treatment plan. By doing what appears to be “longer” in the beginning of an endeavor—doing necessary research, creating a plan based on that research (and knowledge and experience), and laying the foundation for what is to follow—the overall time spent reaching the goal is almost always shortened. Without mapping out therapy (and again, flexibility is built-in and changes and amendments are a matter of course), it will wander and meander. The problem with not having a mental health treatment plan is that it wastes resources (the patient’s time and money and insurance funds), and most important of all, prolongs suffering. Simply put: A plan will help anyone avoid missteps. (Of course, no plan is perfect and there are always variables and surprises).

Now that we’ve outlined what is in the Mental Health Treatment Plan in our overview of what a treatment plan contains, I’d like to share what I believe are the essential rules about the therapy and treatment plans (if you have more suggestions for rules, please comment!):

1. A mental health treatment plan should be based on a comprehensive and thorough psychosocial evaluation.
2. A mental health treatment plan should be a written plan created by the therapist and patient/client together (except in cases where a severely disabled patient may not be able to contribute).
3. A mental health treatment plan must contain information about a patient’s problems, patient’s goals, patient’s and therapist’s objectives, target dates and check-ins, partners in therapy, recommendations, schedule of services, amendments and changes and any other information deemed necessary to successful treatment (though the actual format and names for this information may vary with each therapist).
4. A mental health treatment plan should be referred to during many if not most therapy sessions and both therapist and patient should have access to the plan.
5. A mental health treatment plan is a living, breathing document—it can and should flex and change as treatment progresses.
6. A mental health treatment plan must contain what we can call a “reconstruct clause”; that is, a written clause that states that if goals and objectives are not completed within a certain time-frame, the therapist and patient will revisit the therapist’s methods and techniques and the patient’s commitment to therapy and decide if they warrant a major change of approach or perhaps even a referral to a new therapist.
7. Any and all courses of therapy or counseling should be based on and utilize a mental health treatment plan.

These seven rudiments of the mental health treatment plan help ensure that therapy is focused on helping patients feel better.

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    Last reviewed: 13 Apr 2010