Treatment Planning Flowchart — From Intake to Goals
Treatment planning is both a clinical and administrative requirement. This flowchart helps you do both — building plans that satisfy documentation requirements and actually guide the clinical work.
What is in this flowchart
Phase 1: Clarifying the presenting problem — clinical questions that elicit specific, functionally grounded problem statements. Why generic statements fail and what to write instead, with examples.
Phase 2: Diagnostic formulation — decision tree for primary diagnosis, secondary diagnoses, rule-outs, and when to defer. A quick reference table matching diagnoses to evidence-based first-line treatment approaches.
Phase 3: Case conceptualization — the 5 P’s framework (predisposing, precipitating, perpetuating, protective, presenting) with clinical questions for each domain and the treatment implications of what you find.
Phase 4: Goal setting — three levels of goals (long-term, medium-term, short-term objectives), SMART goal format with examples, and a goal bank covering depression, anxiety, PTSD, relationship and interpersonal goals, and skills-based goals.
Phase 5: Modality and frequency decisions — when to increase frequency, what modality fits which clinical need, and the referral crosswalk with the When to Refer Out flowchart.
Phase 6: Plan review protocols — formal review triggers and informal session-level tracking. The clinical question to ask clients regularly.
One-page documentation format — a complete treatment plan template ready to use in documentation.