Computer Assisted Clinical Decision Making

The Databank of Program Evaluations (DOPE) is an experimental, on-line, telephone accessible, computerized system for acquiring citations and abstracts of treatment evaluation studies that are catalogued by type of client, type of setting, and type of treatment. Though DOPE has been helpful to clinicians for locating evaluation studies of immediate practical application, it is only one of many databases. The study reported here measures the effectiveness of DOPE on the quantity, quality, appropriateness, and time spent to locate evaluation studies. In four social work fieldwork methods sections, where students had been randomly assigned to DOPE/no-DOPE groups, the only statistically significant differences between the two groups was a substantial saving in time to locate evaluation studies. DOPE is not on-line at this time, but it may become available again soon.