Active clinical trials for "Psychotic Disorders"

The purpose of this study is to screen and evaluate children with psychotic disorders to establish or confirm their diagnosis and to collect data about their condition. This study will also recruit individuals for various treatment studies. Childhood psychotic disorders are debilitating conditions in which children have auditory or visual hallucinations and disorganized thoughts. This study will examine psychotic disorders in children in an inpatient setting. Participants in this study will be admitted to the NIH Clinical Center for up to 9 weeks under one or more of the following conditions: current medication, no medication, or tapered medication. Participants will undergo blood, urine, metabolic, and intellectual functioning tests. An electrocardiogram (EKG) and electroencephalogram (EEG) will be performed. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan of the brain will be taken and infrared oculography will be used to measure eye movements. Participants and their family members may also be asked to participate in a study of genetics in children with psychotic illnesses. Children meeting criteria for childhood onset schizophrenia may be offered participation in a medication comparison protocol.

The purpose of this trial is to explore parent-child interactions in parents with and without psychosis, and ascertain whether a brief (10 week) supported self-help parenting program offered to parents in their own homes can help improve parents' self-efficacy and general well-being, as well as interpretations of their parent-child relationship and child behaviour in children who are 3-10 years old.

This study will examine whether or not the use of digital communication methods (text messages and emails) improves patient engagement with Early Intervention Psychosis (EIP) Services, compared to standard communication methods (letters and telephone calls). One of the biggest challenges of psychiatric services is patient disengagement. People with psychosis, are often difficult to engage in community based mental health services (CMHTs). Patient's who disengage from psychiatric care often have higher social care needs, are often more unwell and are more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act compared to those who engage. It is important to examine the reasons for this for both research and clinical reasons to establish the effectiveness of the service to its users. Importance must be placed on the clinician's perspective of the engagement; the patient's perspective is vital. This study is a pilot two-arm pragmatic Randomised Control Trial to examine the feasibility of assessing engagement of EIP services through different communication methods. Patients and care-coordinators will use self-reported scales to measure engagement to determine whether this improves through the use of different communication methods. Patients will be asked to consent to being randomly allocated to one of two groups: (i.) Receive letters, phone calls and voicemail's from their care coordinator for standard appointments. OR (ii.) Receive text messages and emails from their care-coordinator for standard appointments. Patients eligible for this study will be in their first six months of care under an EIP CMHT and who have consented to take part. They will be aged 18-35, not a hospital inpatient, have access to the Internet, a mobile phone and who are fluent in the English language. Care-coordinators will assess the feasibility and acceptability of the design and procedures and determine an effective sample size calculation for a future large scale pragmatic Randomised Controlled Trial.

Severe mental illnesses have a significant social cost, as much by their impact on the sick as on their entourage. The Deinstitutionalization and care in the community of patients with severe mental illness result in increased families and loved ones (also known as "informal caregivers" or "informal caregivers") If psychoeducation programs have been developed to help caregivers better manage and cope with the illness of the person being helped (optimize the quality of care, manage anxiety and isolation, these initiatives appear minimal in view of the magnitude of the burden (notion of burden: "burden") and the suffering of caregivers. Quality of life levels remain extremely low compared to the general population, nearly 4 out of 10 caregivers show a sense of inability to cope with the "permanent anxiety" of this load, 1/3 feels depressed and over 1/10 feels isolated on a personal and professional level

Antipsychotic medications frequently cause metabolic side-effects, such as abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, cholesterol abnormalities, and blood sugar dysregulation, all of which can lead to what is known as the Metabolic Syndrome and serious long-term cardiovascular health problems. Therefore, it is important that metabolic issues be addressed as part of a holistic approach to the mental health treatment of these patients. As with the general population, improving metabolic health involves lifestyle changes - i.e., addressing daily habits regarding eating, physical exercise, stress and sleep management, and lifestyle habits such as smoking. However, there is growing recognition in the medical field that education is not enough for people to create meaningful and sustained lifestyle change. The emerging field of Integrative Health Coaching addresses this issue and provides a clinical framework for helping people successfully develop and achieve personalized lifestyle goals. The investigators have therefore decided to investigate whether health coaching techniques may have benefit in addressing metabolic health issues in people with psychosis disorders. The intent is to complement usual psychiatric and medical care, and also promote patient engagement in managing one's overall health. This study will investigate whether Integrative Health Coaching is a useful clinical tool to facilitate healthy lifestyle behaviour and thereby improve metabolic health in people with psychosis disorders.

This project aims at generating evidence of a work-rehabilitation strategy that benefits the people with severe mental illness (SMI) who want to work, increase their sense of well-being and integration in society, decrease their financial dependence and experiences of stigma and discrimination. The project is likely to help form the basis of how to implement the evidence based supported employment (SE)-model, Individual Placement and Support model (IPS), in a Swedish work-rehabilitation context. In the long run, evidence of SE in a Swedish context could help to decrease the period of sick-leave and increase fulfilling and productive lifestyles among people with severe mental illness. In all, the effectiveness of SE can improve the quality of life for the target group, the quality in mental health care rehabilitation and decrease the costs of treatment and care.

There is a lack of incentive approach for patients who suffer from schizophrenia yet lack the insight to accept treatment. Most existing approaches involve coercion and involuntary hospitalizations. This study will explore whether patients with poor insight and lacking in competence for treatment decisions will improve their acceptance and adherence of depot injection antipsychotic medication if a financial incentive is offered. Ethical considerations are also explored for this innovative pilot study

Patients with schizophrenia show enhanced dopamine synthesis capacity and release, an effect that can be evoked in healthy subjects by repeated amphetamine administration. Therefore for the first time the relationship between dopamine synthesis and release will be studied in healthy subjects before and after amphetamine sensitization in order to better understand adaptive mechanisms of the dopamine system.

COronaVIrus Disease or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome -CoV-2 or COVID-19, mortality occurs mainly from immunological behavior or by suicide after healing . In both cases, the causal link is coronavirus within the host response. The rationale of use of deep yoga breathing as adjuvant treatment to COVID-19 disease , is linked to the mechanical action to stimulate the vagus nerve through scalene and sternocleidomastoid muscles function of which the continuity of action bring to modulate upto suppress, the inflammatory reflex and pro-inflammatory cytokines overproduction and contextual lowering of the sympathetic stress response as a first cause of sleep and late mental disorders which can increase the annual suicide rate. An easily breathing medical Yoga protocol has been developed to test a cost-effective care provision, training, contact tracing and mass efficacy testing.

In times of pandemics, social distancing, isolation and quarantine exacerbate depression and anxiety as confined people are detached from their loved ones, deprived of personal liberties, and devoid of purpose owing to altered routine and livelihood (1,2). Those with pre-existing mental health problems or illnesses (MHPIs) might suffer from limiting interpersonal interactions that are central to their self-management, as well as reduced access to helpful but "non-essential" (often cancelled) psychiatric services (3). In response to this situation, this feasibility study of a trial consists of offering a transitional measure of online peer support for people suffering from (a) psychotic disorders or (b) anxiety and mood disorders, and to determine an effect size to this Peer Support Workers-delivered intervention in terms of both personal-civic recovery and clinical recovery (4). Peer Support Workers (PSWs) are persons with first-hand lived experience of MHPIs, and who are further along in their own recovery journey. As recommended by recovery-oriented best practices guidelines (5,6), upon training and certification they can provide supportive services when hired to fill such a paid specialty position directly in, or in conjunction with, current psychiatric services. Indeed, recovery focuses on how individuals can have more active control over their lives (agency). It is characterized by a search for the person's strengths and capacities, satisfying and meaningful social roles, and mobilizing formal and informal support systems. Peer support has thus become one predominant concept in the recovery paradigm and PSWs are specialized in peer support. Yet, not much is known about the efficacy of PSWs from a consumer's perspective of personal-civic recovery. The five principal research questions are whether this online intervention will have an impact in terms of (Q1) personal-civic recovery potential and (Q2) clinical recovery potential, (Q3) how these potentials can be impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, (Q4) how the lived experience of people in recovery can be mobilized to cope with such a situation, and (Q5) how sex and gender considerations can be taken into account for the pairing of PSWs with service users, beyond considerations based solely on psychiatric diagnoses or specific MHPIs.