What Polaris-CD Measures

The Intake and Update instruments are administered at admission, and concurrently with treatment, respectively. Each patient completes one Intake and may complete multiple Update assessments. Both Intake and Update instruments contain a modified (abbreviated) version of the Addiction Severity Index (ASI). Via computational algorithms in the Polaris-CD software, the core set of items produces scores indicating the severity of the patient’s problems in the following areas:

•  Drug use
•  Alcohol use
•  Family/social
•  Psychological
•  Medical
•  Employment
•  Self-efficacy

•   Patient demographics
•   Treatment history
•   Risk factors for program dropout or relapse

Items included only on the Update instrument ask the patient to report:

•   Number of services they received in relation to various problem areas during the past two weeks
•   Attitudes relating to relapse avoidance.

Two types of reports are produced by Polaris-CD, individual patient reports and aggregate, program-level reports.

Patient reports are printed after every Polaris-CD administration. The Intake report is formatted to present information relating to each of the following clinical issues:

1) Reliability of the information presented
2) Critical clinical issues (e.g., suicidality)
3) Reasons for seeking treatment
4) Areas of concern
5) Severity of problems in each area
6) Relapse risk factors
7) Self-efficacy

The Update report is also formatted to address issues of patient change during treatment:

1) Reliability of the information presented
2) Critical clinical issues
3) Change in areas of concern
4) Change in perceived need for treatment
5) Change in problem severity
6) Change in self-efficacy
7) Relationship of services received to problem areas

The Intake and Update reports are printed automatically after each assessment. Polaris-CD also provides, at staff request, a “Q and A” report listing all questions on the assessment along with the patient’s response to each.

Aggregate reports can be produced for any interval of treatment (e.g., covering all patients admitted during the specified time interval). The Intake (aggregate) report presents summary data collected on the Intake assessment for all patients that completed the Intake assessment during the specified interval. The Patient Progress report shows various indicators of patient improvement for all patients that completed both an Intake and an Update assessment during the interval. The indicators are typically change scores based upon the difference between the Intake and most recent Update data available for each patient.

Counselor Questionnaire (Optional)

Polaris-CD includes a counselor questionnaire designed for programs that intend to use the system for utilization review or clinical supervision, or to improve their ability to predict a patient’s response to treatment. The form is very brief, requiring five minutes to complete at intake and two minutes later in treatment. The counselor may provide DSM codes, case severity indicators, and an assessment of the patient’s motivation for treatment, progress, and prognosis.

Results: Matched patients stayed in treatment longer, were more likely to complete treatment, and had better post-treatment outcomes (e.g., reduction of 30% in treatment re-entry during the first six months after discharge) than the unmatched patients in the same programs, with the same counselors.