Integrating behavioral health and physical health concerns, LOCUS provides a common language and set of standards with which to make consistently sound judgments and recommendations. With LOCUS, clinicians and managers of healthcare resources have an instrument that is simple, easy to understand and use, but is also meaningful and sufficiently sensitive to distinguish appropriate needs and services. It provides clear, reliable and consistent measures that are relevant for making decisions related to quality of care, quality improvement and resource allocation.

Both LOCUS and CALOCUS have four main objectives. The first is to provide a system for assessment of service needs based on six evaluation parameters. The second is to describe a continuum of service intensities, characterized by the amount and scope of resources available at each "level" of care, in each of four categories of service. The third is to create a methodology for quantifying the assessment of service needs to permit reliable determinations for placement in the service continuum. The fourth is to facilitate clinical management and documentation.

This system is a dynamic one, and it has evolved over the years of its development. Its simple style and structure has invited use not only by a variety of clinicians with various levels of training, but also by service users themselves. This allows assessment to become a collaborative process. Engagement in this collaboration is central to person centered treatment planning. We continue to encourage collaboration in the assessment process whenever this is possible, and the accessible language of the instruments accommodates that process. The LOCUS and CALOCUS instruments continue to demonstrate multiple potential uses:

At the individual client level:

• To assess immediate service needs (e.g., for clients in crisis)

• To monitor the course of recovery and service needs over time

• To provide valid, value driven guidance to payers for medical necessity criteria the application of which will better meet the needs of clients in real world systems

• To inform treatment planning processes

At the system or population level:

• To plan system level resource needs for complex populations over time and help identify deficits in the service array

• To assist in the development of bundled payments or case rates for episodes of care for specific clinical conditions

• To provide a framework for a comprehensive system of clinical management and documentation

• To facilitate communication between systems of care regarding service intensity needs