The pre-conference educational program on early psychosis dovetails with the efforts of SMI Adviser, APA’s clinical support system for patients with serious mental illness.

APA’s 2019 fall conference, IPS: The Mental Health Services Conference, is being held at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel from October 3 to 6. This year’s meeting features a pre-conference program on early psychosis. Advance registration rates end September 24. iStock/Sean Pavone

The Second National Conference on Advancing Early Psychosis Care, a one-day, clinically focused pre-conference on early psychosis care, will precede this year’s IPS: The Mental Health Services Conference. The pre-conference will take place Wednesday, October 2—the day before the start of IPS—and will be held in the same location, the Sheraton New York Times Square. The pre-conference theme is “The Complexities of Real-World Care.”

APA and SMI Adviser, APA’s clinical support system for serious mental illness (SMI), partnered with PEPPNET (Psychosis-Risk and Early Psychosis Program Network), the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to sponsor the conference.

SMI Adviser supports implementation of evidence-based, person-centered pharmacological and psychosocial interventions for individuals with SMI. In July 2018, APA was awarded a five-year, $14.2 million grant from SAMHSA to support this initiative.

“PEPPNET’s pre-conference will enhance IPS: The Mental Health Services Conference by pulling together clinicians of all disciplines to discuss best practices for treating those with early psychosis,” said APA Director of Education Tristan Gorrindo, M.D. “This type of education is at the core of what APA is trying to do with SMI Adviser.”

Steven Adelsheim, M.D., director of PPEPNET, says the benefits of early intervention for psychosis and for those at risk for psychosis have merited investment by NIMH and SAMHSA.

Steven Adelsheim M.D., a clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University and director of PEPPNET, said that conference participants will learn how to translate the latest research in clinical high-risk and early psychosis into community-based clinical care; how to apply person- and family-centered principles to clinical high-risk and early psychosis care; how to address substance use issues in clinical high-risk and early psychosis interventions; and how to manage clinical challenges commonly encountered in affective psychosis care.

“In recent years there has been a growing emphasis on identification of young people at clinical high risk for psychosis and [implementation of] early, intensive treatment for those who have had a first psychotic episode,” said Adelsheim. “The federal government has increased its commitment to this effort because of the benefits we have seen in long-term outcomes for young people at risk for psychosis and those who have [had] a shorter duration of untreated psychosis.

“We are excited to partner with APA, NIMH, and SAMHSA in bringing this second national conference focusing on early psychosis support and intervention to the IPS meeting in New York,” he said. “The conference will be an opportunity to bring psychiatrists together with clinicians from other disciplines to develop skills in coordinated specialty care for first-episode psychosis and interventions for those at clinical high risk. We need psychiatrists to be at the table in this effort.”

Register Now at Low Advance Rates! IPS: The Mental Health Services Conference will be held October 3 to 6 at the Sheraton New York Times Square. Register online at psychiatry.org/IPS, where you will also find information about housing and the full scientific program. This year’s conference is presented in collaboration with the World Psychiatric Association.

PEPPNET started in September 2014 with a meeting of approximately 30 advocates, government agency representatives, researchers, and clinicians engaged in clinical high-risk and early psychosis intervention, research, and service development. A consensus emerged to formalize this network of experts and collaborate on an ongoing basis to formalize clinical best practices, organize training approaches and metrics, and provide leadership to communities nationwide who are implementing high-risk and early psychosis programs. Through a one-year grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 2015, the Stanford University Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences initiated the development of an infrastructure to support PEPPNET in expanding clinical high-risk and first-episode psychosis program training, coordination, and awareness.

Through regular meetings, multiple subgroups, a national listserv, and website, PEPPNET supports the development and dissemination of evidence-based best practices and evaluation standards.

Keynote speakers at the pre-conference include Lisa Dixon, M.D., a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University and editor of Psychiatric Services, who will speak on “Early Psychosis Intervention: Moving From Research to On-the-Ground Community Practice,” and Dost Öngür, M.D., Ph.D., chief of the Psychotic Disorders Division and director of the Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder Research Program at McLean Hospital, who will speak on “First-Episode Affective Psychosis.” ■