A contemporary protocol to assist primary care physicians in the treatment of panic and generalized anxiety disorders

Anxiety disorders are prevalent in primary care practice and generate a significant excess of morbidity, health services utilization, and health care expenditures. Complexities in delivering effective care for such disorders have led to stepped collaborative care models that involve nonphysician care managers following guideline-based protocols under the direction of patients’ primary care physicians and a medical specialist. With the goal of aiding colleagues attempting to improve the primary care for panic and generalized anxiety disorders, we detail the collaborative care strategy for treatment of these conditions used by our National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)-funded clinical trial in which a telephone-based care manager performs timely, patient-specific clinical and case management tasks. We illustrate the clinical considerations underlying the steps taken to implement and then sustain our care manager intervention at four geographically dispersed primary care practices linked by a common electronic medical record system and the modifications made as we encountered clinical situations common to typical practice settings. This report serves to familiarize physicians contemplating use of a similar strategy for improving the quality of primary care for an anxiety disorder or any other chronic mental health condition.