Benefits

Polaris-Youth provides important benefits to all stakeholders of treatment:

Adolescents and families

• Helps determine the appropriate type and intensity of services needed
• Facilitates family and adolescent participation in treatment planning and monitoring
• Requires minimal time to complete the survey

Clinicians

• Provides a profile of adolescent and family strengths as well as symptoms
• Establishes the need for initial and ongoing treatment and measures progress throughout treatment
• Documents clinical history/current severity of the adolescent as well as motivation for obstacles to treatment
• Screens for chemical dependency and critical signs
• Supports strength-based treatment

Office staff

• Requires little training to use system software
• Experience a negligible increase in their work load
• Are provided with software tools for the efficient management of data collection

Program managers/administrators

• Obtain standardized, reliable, severity adjusted outcomes data
• May use the system as the foundation for meaningful CQI initiatives
• May use aggregate data to respond to payers, accreditation requirements, and for proposals
• Profiles effectiveness of counselors with specific types of adolescents

Payers

• Can enhance, and reduce the staff time required for, utilization review
• Receive standardized and clinically relevant information about program performance
• Are able to document the quality of the care that they purchase