Standardised and timely restricted care for anxiety disorders has replaced former treatment in the Mental Health Services in the Capital Region of Denmark. Currently, there is no documentation regarding the impact of treatment standardisation on patient outcome and on service delivery.

The aim is to investigate

1. i) the effect of standardised treatment on patient outcome, and

2. ii) the implementation outcomes of standardised treatment programs for anxiety disorders in clinical practice.

The study is conducted as a quasi-experimental prospective pre-post study in a naturalistic setting in which patients are referred randomly to the two mental health centres. Patients included in the study are aged above18 years and referred to standardised treatment for anxiety disorders (F40-41). The Conceptual Model of Implementation Research [1] distinguishes between outcomes at three different levels: implementation, service and client (patient), and argues that client outcomes depend on outcomes of the previous levels. This study includes outcomes at all levels. The clinical outcome data include the Symptom Check List-90R, Beck Anxiety Inventory, Global Assessment of Functioning and WHO Wellbeing Index.

The first patient was included in October 2012. The study design will be described in details and preliminary results presented.

From January 2013 standardised and timely restricted care for anxiety disorders are introduced at a national level in Denmark, which further increase the relevance of the present study.