Treatment & Support Services

This issue brief reviews the importance of measuring implementation fidelity, lists the core components of CSC to monitor via fidelity measures, suggests potential data sources for measuring these core components, and reviews ways data from these sources can be aggregated into measures of CSC fidelity.

This manual is designed to guide implementation of a team-based program to serve individuals who are experiencing emerging psychosis within an existing mental health clinic (MHC). It provides information on administrative issues between the team and the clinic, such as hiring team members, managing team caseloads, providing services outside of the clinic setting, using the clinic’s support staff for smooth team functioning, and sharing space and resources. Other critical implementation issues discussed involve training and ongoing supervision of team members, ways to measure fidelity to the team model, and how to build supervision and fidelity assessment into ongoing practice within the clinic.

This tip sheet for clinicians describes strategies to successfully engage families, including helping solve practical problems and understanding the family’s goals.

The aim of this course is to increase providers’ awareness of and ability to respond to diverse stakeholder perspectives on early psychosis, including the perspectives of members of underrepresented socioeconomic, racial/ethnic, and cultural minority groups. It is grounded in dozens of in-depth interviews with early-intervention clients and former clients, parents, and community-based providers, and features nine characters whose stories are all derived from actual interviews.

This webinar discusses family education and support in the CSC model and is co-presented by a professional with expertise in in this area, as well as an individual with lived experience.

This webinar provides an overview of the landscape of family involvement practices in CSC and approaches taken to engaging families in different programs and models, discusses key challenges in family engagement related to cultural diversity and socioeconomic disadvantage, and then focuses in on Texas’ efforts to utilize family partners in CSC, describing the development of the family partner role, and the specifics of implementation in the context of the OnTrackUSA model.

This presentation introduces the role of peer specialists within the NYS specific CSC team, OnTrackNY, and shares an inside perspective of the work of peer specialists. Covering the role responsibilities, collaborative work, and support schedule will give participants the opportunity to understand the unique focus of peer specialist staff on CSC teams and how they can be best integrated into multidisciplinary teams.

This webinar explores the use of peers to support family engagement and re-engagement, including describing the use of peers to prevent losing family supports and facilitation of family reunification following disconnection. Two programs address strategies, challenges, and lessons learned about how to facilitate and support continued family engagement and re-engagement.

This issue brief reports the results that emerged in interviews with staff who are implementing programs that integrate the Individual Placement and Support Model (IPS) and Supported Education for Transition age youth (SEd), with program developers/implementers who are continuing to explore promising new integrative approaches and with individuals who have statewide roles in IPS/SEd.

This issue brief provides a primer on the rationale for and techniques that are involved in delivering supported education services in First Episode Psychosis (FEP) programs.

This guide provides recommendations to Coordinated Specialty Care (CSC) staff who help facilitate transitions from CSC programs and provides practical strategies for assessing readiness for transition, identifying post-CSC goals and needs, finding appropriate community resources to meet these needs, making referrals to formal services, managing the actual transition, and conducting follow-up. In addition to discussing the steps involved in making a single referral, this guide offers suggestions for building a referral network.

This short training series consists of three parts: An Overview of Psychosis, Early Intervention and Transition, and Recommendations for Continuing Care.

This webinar provides an overview of the current findings regarding longer term outcomes for persons being discharged from FEP programs and alternative discharge strategies, as well as discusses the experiences of two CSC programs regarding a two year limit on FEP enrollment and the strategies that they have used to address concerns.

This provider summary of the VA/DoD First-Episode Psychosis and Schizophrenia clinical practice guideline (CPG) provides an evidence-based framework for evaluating and managing care for patients with first-episode psychosis and schizophrenia toward improving clinical outcomes. Successful implementation of this CPG will assess the patient’s condition and collaborate with the patient, family, and caregivers to determine optimal management of patient care, emphasize the use of patient-centered care and shared decision making, minimize preventable complications and morbidity, and optimize health outcomes.

This video series provides an overview of shared decision making, which reflects the values of collaboration, engagement, self-determination, and respect that infuse every aspect of what teams do.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Psychosis (CBTp) ePrimer serves as a primer in foundational concepts related to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and its application to psychotic symptoms and experiences. 

This fact sheet provides an overview of the principles and practices of CBTp, with case examples illustrating each of the key components in its application.

This webinar aims to explore the complex relationship between social media, the Internet and early psychosis intervention and to cultivate a unified approach to researching and implementing these ubiquitous resources into clinical care.

This webinar discusses use trends in digital technologies among youth, mobile health (mHealth) interventions for psychosis, and the user-centered development of two novel mHealth approaches to help-seeking and self-management support for young adults at risk for psychosis and their families.

This clinical brief describes telehealth and discusses its benefits in the treatment of young people at risk for psychosis, as well as the benefits of using telehealth vs. traditional therapy.  

This clinical brief describes Cognitive Remediation Therapy (CRT) and its benefits for psychosis treatment. 

This webinar reviews the team-based approach to medication management in early psychosis treatment, including the role of non-prescribers in supporting positive health behaviors for patients experiencing early-course psychosis. Recent updates in our understanding of psychiatry for early-course psychosis are reviewed and medication management with two individuals with lived experiences of psychosis is discussed.

This presentation provides an update on the phenomenology, services, and treatments available for people with first episode psychosis as well as lessons learned from the perspective of someone who has worked on a CSC team.   

This course is designed for professionals in diverse settings who work with teens and young adults and who are interested in learning about the early warning signs of psychosis, appropriate early intervention treatment and supports, and strategies for successfully engaging youth in effective, recovery-oriented care.

This infographic summarizes psychosis and symptom progression, highlights the importance of early intervention, and reviews barriers to and tips for treatment engagement. 

This fact sheet is designed to provide the mental health workforce with information about Coordinated Speciality Care (CSC) for First Episode Psychosis.

This webinar series covers CSC topics, including peer specialist services, culturally responsive CSC for early psychosis, individual therapy, what is early psychosis, family psychoeducation and support, medication mangement, and supported employment. Each webinar is co-presented by a professional with expertise in that component of care as well as an individual with lived experience who can speak to how the aspect of care was meaningful in their journey towards recovery.

This brief describes several adaptations and recommendations that CSC teams may consider to enhance the effectiveness of the specialized treatment model to best serve persons with affective psychosis or individuals with substance use disorders.

This issue brief provides an overview of the epidemiology, presentation, diagnosis, and treatment of individuals with substance-induced psychosis who may present to First Episode Psychosis (FEP) programs.

This fact sheet provides FEP program directors and administrators with a brief introduction to the intersection of trauma and psychosis and an overview of a trauma-informed approach.

This issue brief provides an overview of the attributes of a trauma-informed First Episode Psychosis program using SAMHSA’s 10 organizational domains of a trauma-informed approach, as well as a range of clinical interventions, tools, and resources to support effective trauma treatment.

This webinar explores how mental health and substance use treatment providers currently care for women with co-occurring first episode psychosis (FEP), serious mental illness (SMI), and substance use disorder (SUD), and what questions remain in relation to treating this population.

This guide reviews interventions on treating substance misuse and substance use disorders (SUD) in youth with serious emotional disturbances (SED), distills the research into recommendations for practice, and provides examples of the ways that these recommendations can be implemented.

This guide reviews the literature on treating substance misuse and substance use disorders in the context of first-episode psychosis, distills the research into recommendations for practice, and provides examples of the ways that these recommendations can be implemented by first-episode psychosis treatment programs.

This webinar series covers a range of topics related to First Episode Psychosis including: Advances in Mental Health Stigma Reduction, Psychoeducation and Psychosis, Race-Based Stress and Psychosis, Psychosis- Risk Stigma, Youth Mental Health Stigma, Psychosis & Resilience, What is Psychosis-Risk, Early-Stage Psychosis "Basics": Screening and Referral, Combating Early Psychosis Basics, Telehealth for Early-Stage Psychosis: COVID-19 and Beyond, Early Psychosis and the Justice System: Prevention and Intervention Strategies, Cultural Considerations in Early Psychosis Care, Evidence- Based Early Psychosis Identification and Treatment.