Treatment Personalization Can Promote Mental Health Equity by Addressing Stigma

Abstract

Treatment personalization refers to tailoring treatment to address client characteristics that predict treatment response. Treatment approaches that are flexible by design may be particularly well-suited for treatment personalization. One such approach is modular treatment, which provides a menu of treatment procedures (i.e., a menu of modules) that can be differentially selected and sequenced based on individual client needs. Because of their flexible nature, modular treatments require more clinician decision-making compared to more prescriptive approaches with a predetermined sequence of sessions. Indeed, Venturo-Conerly et al. (2022) find that clinical judgment is the most common decision-making tool for clinicians using modular youth psychotherapies. This commentary briefly reviews relevant literature on a factor associated with clinical judgment, treatment outcomes, and mental health inequities: stigma. Conceptual and empirical recommendations supporting the integration of treatment personalization and stigma are provided, including the efficient adaptation, evaluation, and scaling up of existing evidence-based treatments, and widespread efforts to train clinicians in generalizable culturally- responsive practices.