Let’s Clearly Distinguish Evidence-based Practice and Empirically Supported Treatments

ABSTRACT

Evidence based practice [EBP] has had a strong influence on social work practice, research, and education. EBP is a multi-step process for health care decision making which includes relevant research findings in treatment planning together with the client’s preferences and clinical expertise. An empirically supported treatments [EST] is a designation for treatments for a given disorder that have met specific standards for research quality. ESTs are often part of the EBP process but are not identical to it. This article reports results from a review of relevant 200 articles from the Social Work Abstracts database, showing social workers fail to distinguish the two concepts, and often fail to define them fully and clearly. More published reports conflate ESTs with EBP than correctly distinguish the two concepts. Recommendation to strengthen future social work publications, practice and education are offered.

KEYWORDS:

• Evidence-based practice
• empirically supported treatments
• clinical social work practice
• social work research

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

James W. Drisko

James W. Drisko has written extensively on evidence-based practice and other aspects of psychotherapy outcome research. He was elected to the National Academies of Practice in Social Work in 2008 and was named a First Cohort Fellow, social for Social Work and Research in 2014.

Anne Friedman

Anne Friedman is a clinical social worker at LifeLong Medical, a federally qualified health center in Oakland, CA. She is also a post-resident doctoral student at Smith College School for Social Work