An evaluation of the process of measuring outcomes of a cognitive stimulation therapy group

The evaluation took place in an NHS Older People’s Mental Health community service in the east of England. One intervention provided by these teams is a Cognitive Stimulation Therapy (CST) group, an evidence-based therapy for people with dementia. This evaluation was completed in the context of procedural changes following the Covid-19 pandemic. CST groups moved from face-to-face to online delivery, and there were changes in the clinical systems used across the service. These changes led to inconsistencies in how outcome measures were administered and how data was gathered and stored across the teams. The aim was to recommend improvements to the procedures for evaluating the CST groups, namely, the use of outcome measures. Data on processes was acquired from professionals and quantitative data was procured from the clinical records system. A literature review was carried out to summarise the most recent evidence on outcome measures used to evaluate the CST intervention. This resulted in descriptive data about the inconsistencies across teams in evaluating the CST group. Findings focused on descriptive data and recommendations were shared with the service about the most efficacious process and outcome measure to evaluate the CST group.