Background Clinicians usually conduct diagnostic assessments in order to establish a diagnosis or to evaluate the effect of treatment. One meta-analysis suggests that diagnostic assessment administered in collaboration with the patient along with personalized feedback might have a therapeutic effect.
Methods We wish to carry out a systematic-review and meta-analysis of the effect on symptomatology when using assessment as a therapeutic intervention for patients with psychiatric illness. We will search in five relevant electronic databases. Two reviewers will independently conduct article selection against pre-defined eligibility criteria, data extraction and quality assessment of included studies. Randomized studies that report on the use of psychological assessment as an intervention will be included in the meta-analysis. We will extract data on symptom-related outcomes, quality of life, dropout and re-diagnoziation and use meta-analysis techniques to compute the effect size of assessmentrelated psychotherapeutic interventions. The review will be conducted and reported according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis statement (PRISMA). Risk of bias will be assessed by using the Risk of Bias tool RoB 2.0 of the Cochrane Collaboration.
Discussion The results will be able to inform clinicians and policymakers on the effect of assessment, and, depending on the results, could lead to a recommendation for modified assessment procedures and approaches in the mental health services. Ultimately, it might improve the outcome of treatment in the mental health services.
Registration Registered in PROSPERO: Registration number CRD42021270567.