Capon William, Varidel Mathew, Hickie Ian B, Crouse Jacob J, Rosenberg Sebastian, Dimitroupoulos Gina, LaMonica Haley M, Scott Elizabeth M, Iorfino Frank
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW, Australia.
Health Research Institute, University of Canberra, Canberra, ACT, Australia.
Aust N Z J Psychiatry. 2025 May 23;59(9):48674251336030. doi: 10.1177/00048674251336030.
To develop a Service Needs Index that measures a young person's needs across domains relevant to care provision and to examine the index's construction under different assumptions.
A cohort of young people ( = 2193) aged 12-25 years who sought help at youth mental health services across Australia were invited to use a digital platform (Innowell) as part of their care and complete a multidimensional assessment. Using online assessment data from the eligible 1611 individuals (73.5%), a Service Needs Index comprising three sub-indices (Clinical, Psychosocial, and Comorbidity) was constructed under two weighting approaches, an equal weighted scheme and a weighting scheme constructed with expert input and correlation-optimisation. These approaches were examined and compared.
The Clinical, Psychosocial, and Comorbidity Indices were derived using standardised questionnaires to assess mental health symptoms and history, work and social functioning, and physical health and substance use, respectively. The expert input weighting scheme was favoured with less output uncertainty. Among those with the top 25% of Clinical Index scores, almost half also belonged in the group with the top 25% of Psychosocial Index scores, while 11.9% of the total sample were in the bottom 25% percentiles for both Clinical and Psychosocial Index scores.
These indices should be assessed in real-world settings before recommendations are made about their feasibility and acceptability; however, the indices could differentiate between needs to guide individual-level decision-making about service pathways for young people. Furthermore, population-level analyses of these aggregated indices can inform strategic decisions related to service planning and design.
开发一个服务需求指数，用以衡量年轻人在与护理服务相关领域的需求，并在不同假设下检验该指数的构建。
邀请一组年龄在12 - 25岁、在澳大利亚各地青少年心理健康服务机构寻求帮助的年轻人（ = 2193）使用一个数字平台（Innowell）作为其护理的一部分，并完成一项多维评估。利用符合条件的1611名个体（73.5%）的在线评估数据，在两种加权方法下构建了一个包含三个子指数（临床、心理社会和共病）的服务需求指数，一种是等权重方案，另一种是在专家意见和相关性优化基础上构建的加权方案。对这些方法进行了检验和比较。
临床、心理社会和共病指数分别使用标准化问卷得出，以评估心理健康症状和病史、工作和社会功能以及身体健康和物质使用情况。专家意见加权方案更受青睐，其输出不确定性较小。在临床指数得分处于前25%的人群中，几乎一半也属于心理社会指数得分前25%的组，而总样本中有11.9%在临床和心理社会指数得分上均处于后25%百分位。
在就这些指数的可行性和可接受性提出建议之前，应在实际环境中对其进行评估；然而，这些指数可以区分需求，以指导关于年轻人服务路径的个人层面决策。此外，对这些汇总指数的人群层面分析可为与服务规划和设计相关的战略决策提供信息。
