Goal setting for enhancing engagement and retention in digital measurement-based care
Min Kyung Chong, Ian B Hickie, Mathew Varidel, Luke J Borgnolo, Carla Gorban, William Capon, Haley M LaMonica, Adam Poulsen, Ashlee Turner, Sarah McKenna, Frank IorfinoObjective
Digital measurement-based care (MBC) tools can enable personalized, data-informed mental health care at scale, yet their uptake remains limited. Goal setting (GS) is a well-established behaviour change technique that can help overcome this challenge. This study aims to investigate the association between the use of the GS function and digital MBC tool engagement in real-world clinical settings.
Methods
Clients who accessed participating mental health services between November 2018 and September 2024 were invited to use a digital MBC tool as part of routine care. The GS feature within the tool allowed participants to select up to 3 care priorities out of 17 biopsychosocial domains (i.e., psychological, psychosocial, suicidality, and substance use). The engagement patterns (i.e., frequency and duration) between GS users and non-GS users were compared, and characteristics of selected goals were analysed.
Results
A total of 2829 participants used the digital MBC tool and 28% (788/2829) used the GS function. Compared to non-GS users, the frequency of symptom monitoring was 2.6 times higher among GS users (
Conclusion
We show that GS function use is associated with greater digital MBC tool engagement. More active symptom monitoring using the tool ultimately can support clinicians to respond to clients’ changing needs in real-time. Future research should further delineate mechanisms of GS function use in enhancing tool engagement.