Last week, Chile.  This week, Perth, Australia.  Yesterday, I landed in Sydney following a 30 hour flight from the United States.  I managed to catch the last flight out to Perth before all air travel was grounded due to another ash clound–this time coming from Chile!  I say “another” as just over a year ago, I was trapped behind the cloud of ash from the Icelandic eruption!  So far so good.  Today, I’ll spend the day talking about “excellence” in behavioral healthcare.

Before heading out to teach for the day, I wanted to upload a report from a recent research project conducted in Chile investigating the statistical properties of the ORS.  I’ve attached the report here so you can read for yourself.  That said, let me present the highlights:

• The spanish version of the ORS is reliable (alpha coefficients .90-.95).
• The spanish version of the ORS shows good construct and convergent validity (correlations with the OQ45 .5, .58).
• The spanish version of the ORS is sensitive to change in a treated population.

The authors of the report that was presented at the Society for Psychotherapy Research meeting conclude, “The ORS is a valid instrument to be used with the Chilean population.”

As asked in my blogpost last week, “how much more evidence is needed?”  Now, more than ever, clinicians needs simple, valid, reliable, and feasible tools for evaluating the process and outcome of behavioral healthcare.  The ORS and SRS FITS the bill!