Using an Organizational Change Model to Qualitatively Understand Practitioner Adoption of Evidence-Based Practice in Community Mental Health

The essential interface between evidence-based practice (EBP) science and a client’s receipt of quality EBPs in routine community mental health is the practitioner who delivers the treatment. Understanding what happens to the practitioner during EBPs training and dissemination of mental health treatments has not been well studied. Increasing this understanding of practitioners from a one-time snapshot to a longitudinal awareness has never been done. This article describes a routine method to query practitioners on their attitudes about EBPs training and monitor the personal and organizational changes that occur as a result of EBPs adoption. A semistructured in-depth interview adapted from an organizational change model by Tropman (1998) was developed and presented here as a template for investigating this dissemination in one community mental health center. The hour-long interview is particularly attuned to emerging clinical competencies and personal and organizational change. A 15-item Evidencebased Practitioner Attitude Scale (EBPAS; Aarons, 2004) was also used in this study. This innovative longitudinal method can ensure the practitioner’s continued involvement in EBP dissemination efforts (by obtaining their direct feedback), as well as serve as a means to head off drift in EBP fidelity, although this is not the primary intent of this article.