Implementation of evidence-based treatments for borderline personality disorder: The impact of organizational changes on treatment outcome of mentalization-based treatment

The quality of implementation of evidence-based treatment programs for borderline personality disorder (BPD) in routine clinical care is a neglected issue. The first aim of this mixed-method naturalistic study was to explore the impact of organizational changes on treatment effectiveness of a day-hospital programme of mentalization-based treatment. Consecutively referred BPD patients were divided into a pre-reorganization cohort (PRE-REORG) and a cohort during reorganization (REORG). Psychiatric symptoms (Brief Symptom Inventory) and personality functioning (Severity Indices of Personality Problems-118) before treatment and at 18- and 36-month follow-up were compared using multilevel modelling. Effect sizes in the PRE-REORG cohort were approximately twice as large at 18 months (PRE-REORG: range 0.81-1.22; REORG: range 0.03-0.71) and three times as large at 36 months (PRE-REORG: range 0.81-1.80; REORG: range 0.27-0.81). The quantitative results of this study suggest that even when mentalization-based treatment is successfully implemented and the structure of the programme remains intact, major organizational changes may have a considerable impact on its effectiveness. Second, we aimed to explore the impact of the reorganization on adherence at organizational, team and therapist level. The qualitative results of this study indicate that the organizational changes were negatively related to adherence to the treatment model at organizational, team and therapist level, which in turn was associated with a decrease in treatment effectiveness. The implications of these findings for the implementation of effective treatments for BPD in routine clinical practice are discussed. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.