The Sunrise Commitment to Quality Improvement

Doing What We Do Best ... Even Better

Given the importance of the work we do with children and families, we're committed to using only the most current and effective therapeutic approaches available. Sunrise, like all InnerChange programs, achieves this by engaging in a robust program of continuous quality improvement. Our quality improvement program is based on six pillars that help ensure we're implementing the best research-supported treatment approaches available. We ensure program quality through frequent:

• Education and professional development opportunities
• Formal client feedback
• Professional interdisciplinary collaboration
• Internal and external peer review
• Accreditation and certification
• Longitudinal outcome studies

Educational and Professional Development

Our teachers, therapists and staff members receive ongoing cross-disciplinary education in the form of regular internal training as well as specialty-specific continuing education provided by professional institutes and universities. At any given time, several members of our team are likely to pursuing yet another advanced certification or degree; at Sunrise we know that that development of our team as a whole relies on the development of each team member and each specialty. Our commitment to professional education keeps us on the front edge of adolescent care, giving us continuous access to best practices.

Formal Client Feedback

Our families are the best measure of how we're doing. The collective wisdom of our clientele is what allows us to provide a place that delivers effective healing in a manner that feels safe, nurturing, and home like. Our approach to everything from family therapy to billing practices is informed by ongoing formal and informal client feedback-both during and after treatment.

Interdisciplinary Team Approach

Our commitment to a team-intensive approach to treatment means that our therapists, teachers and staff work with the benefit of a wide and deep network of professional expertise. Treatment is something that no one professional can do alone; our team members benefit enormously from the synergy of collaboration, as well as from education that organically occurs when professionals from different disciplines come together to solve a challenging problem. Our definition of "team" expands well beyond the walls of Sunrise, which means that we actively engage the professional wisdom of therapists, consultants, psychiatrists, medical staff and educators from other programs, practices and professional institutes. Truly, this kind of collaboration yields a treatment whole that is much great than the sum of its professionals.

Peer Review

InnerChange is a family of adolescent and young adult treatment programs that is united in its dedication to helping families heal. We know the value of peer review for creating a safe yet intensive form of accountability and continuous improvement, and we understand the value of having such a large pool of peers to tap into. Through mutual campus visits, case collaboration, program development assistance and formal peer review, Sunrise benefits from the input of its "relatives" at Fulshear and New Haven. We also have regular visits from outside professionals, including referring professionals, guest trainers, and accreditation teams, all of whom play a role in reviewing and improving our practices.

Accreditation and Certification

In addition to meeting or exceeding all legally mandated standards for residential care, Sunrise elects to participate in voluntary accreditation and certification activities in order to create addition opportunities for externally-driven evaluation and program improvement. Whether it's the Joint Commission evaluating our treatment program, NAAS reviewing the quality of our academics or EAGALA critiquing our equine-assisted therapy, Sunrise welcomes these formal reviews as opportunities to do what we do best ... even better.

Longitudinal Outcome Studies

Sunrise is proud to participate in the InnerChange tradition of tracking outcomes data using empirically based assessment tools. To ensure accuracy, we only use outcomes assessment tools that are nationally recognized for their reliability and validity, such as the Youth Outcomes Questionnaire (YOQ). These tools allow us to track data over time that shows us how we're really doing. Fortunately, the data is highly encouraging. While our main purpose for gathering this information is to comb it for areas to improve upon, we're awfully excited that it confirms the overall quality of our program. In fact, according to our data:

• 100% of parents (regarding their daughters) and 88% of students tested as experiencing a statistically significant reduction in overall symptoms between admit and discharge at Sunrise
• 92% of students completing Sunrise tested as experiencing symptoms in the healthy range upon leaving Sunrise
• Following treatment, parents reported 94% fewer social problems and 90% fewer relationship problems in their daughters
• Following treatment, 100% of students tested as experiencing significantly fewer social and relationship problems

Why We Work So Hard: Happy Families

It's heartening for us at Sunrise to see the fruits of our intensive efforts at quality improvement not only in outcomes data, but in the letters and calls and visits we regularly receive from happy parents and healed children. It's the outcomes data that affirms our efforts, but the heartfelt thanks we receive from families is what warm our hearts and inspires us to keep going.