Evidence-Based Psychiatry

Abstract

Efficacious, effective, and efficient psychiatric treatments are needed to reduce the burden of mental disorders. Evidence-based psychiatry is the process that facilitates the translation of research from the bench to the bedside. The ‘evidence’ in evidence-based psychiatry is graded according to a hierarchy. Randomized controlled trial(s) are considered to be at the apex of this hierarchy. Most randomized controlled trials use categorical disorders as their primary outcome variable but categorical disorders have limited validity. Pragmatic approaches to improving the ‘evidence’ in evidence-based psychiatry by accounting for the nature of mental disorders are, therefore, needed and are described herein.