The Child and Adolescent Symptom Inventory-Progress Monitor: a brief Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition-referenced parent-report scale for children and adolescents

Abstract

The Child and Adolescent Symptom Inventory-Progress Monitor-Parent Form (CASI-PM-P) is a 29-item rating scale designed to evaluate symptom change for commonly referred child and adolescent disorders. Its intended applications include monitoring longer-term changes in clinical status and assessing intervention responsiveness. To enhance practicality, there is one version of the CASI-PM-P for all age groups with a common set of norms for both genders. Scoring procedures allow clinicians to assess whether observed symptom changes exceeded chance fluctuations. Using a clinical sample of 2,693 children ages 3-17 years, the 29 symptom-related items were identified that had the best item-to-total minus item correlations on the three age-appropriate scales of the Symptom Inventories. Item-to-total minus item correlations of similar magnitude were also obtained for those items with the standardization sample. In clinical samples, the CASI-PM-P scores had both high levels of internal consistency and test-retest reliability and were sensitive to change in a treated sample. Collectively, the findings support the reliability and validity of the CASI-PM-P as a measure of behavioral change in clinical settings, while continued research will be necessary to improve clinical utility and provide better documentation of the scale's strengths and weaknesses.