The Cultural Formulation Interview in Case Formulations: A State-of-the-Science Review

Abstract

The publication of the 16-item Cultural Formulation Interview (CFI) in DSM-5 has initiated a robust line of international scholarship on whether patients and clinicians find it feasible, acceptable, and useful in different practice settings. Studies have routinely concluded that the CFI improves rapport when clinicians use it with patients, though less attention has been focused on how clinicians use information from the CFI in clinical tasks or case formulations. This state-of-the-science review describes the development of the CFI and uses a specific methodology, the state-of-the-art review, to analyze peer-reviewed studies reporting how clinicians have used information from the CFI in clinical tasks, namely diagnostic and treatment planning. Twelve studies met inclusion criteria, with 10 indicating that the CFI was helpful for these tasks. All studies emphasized that the CFI can help clinicians understand the social contexts of patients’ lives. The article concludes with an agenda for future research, such as exploring how preexisting conceptions of culture influence clinical decision making and determining how the CFI affects case formulations.