View clinical trials related to Psychotic Disorders.
Filter by:The goal of this study is to pilot test a culturally tailored Family Psychoeducation model (KUPAA) for adults with psychotic disorders and their relatives that is appropriate for cultural settings inclusive of both traditional and biomedical ideas about mental illness and that incorporates relatives as co-facilitators of the intervention.
Kynurenic acid (KYNA) is a naturally occurring chemical in the brain. Studies with rodents indicate that levels of KYNA can impact levels of the neurotransmitters glutamate and dopamine. One way to reliably increase KYNA levels is by ingesting the amino acid tryptophan. Tryptophan is a normal part of the human diet. Tryptophan gets metabolized/changed to other chemicals in the body- including KYNA. By giving people 6 grams of tryptophan, the investigators will be able to increase the KYNA level in a controlled way. The investigators will then be able to study the effects of KYNA on neurotransmitters by using cognitive tests and magnetic resonance imaging techniques (measuring brain activity and brain chemistry using the MRI magnet). The overall goal of the study is to examine how the medication N-acetylcysteine (NAC), when added to tryptophan, affects various cognitive functions, such as verbal and visual memory. The investigators will also use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to examine how NAC affects brain activity and chemicals.
Approximately 60 chronic smokers with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who are motivated to try to quit smoking will be randomized to receive smoking cessation treatment with the FDA-approved medication, varenicline, delivered either a) at its standard dose and titration schedule (half of the participants) versus b) at a lower dose and slower titration schedule (the other half), for 12 weeks. All smokers will choose a target quit date sometime between 8 to 35 days after starting the medication. All participants will receive ten 30-minute sessions of a behavioral treatment called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). Participants will be followed for an additional 12 weeks off study medication. The major endpoint is the feasibility of combining ACT with the different dosing strategies. Investigators will also conduct a blood test that measures the breakdown of nicotine in the body to explore whether that measure influences treatment response and side effects.
The current study will improve knowledge on the effectiveness and safety of the use of antipsychotics at the prodromal phase and on factors influencing the outcome, and will eventually facilitate optimisation of individualised interventions for psychosis prevention and treatment.
The study population for this research will include parents and concerned significant others (PCSO) of individuals experiencing recent (past five years) onset of a psychotic disorder (hereafter referred to as individuals with psychosis, "IP") who are not currently engaged with, or at risk for disengagement from, treatment. MILO is a brief and structured intervention that teaches motivational interviewing communication strategies. The initial aim (phase 1) of this pilot study is to evaluate feasibility of the intervention. The secondary aims are to evaluate the effectiveness of MILO for (1) enhancing the engagement of IP with evidence-based treatments and (2) reducing distress among PCSO. The investigators hypothesize that the intervention will be superior to control condition for both enhancing IP engagement with mental health services and reducing PCSO distress.
The proposed project seeks to create a California early psychosis network using a core assessment battery of valid, low burden measures and mHealth technology platform to collect client-level data, visualize data via clinician dashboard for treatment planning, and integrate across clinics to provide de-identified data to the national coordinating hub. Research capacity for the network will be tested via development and validation of a measure of the Duration of Untreated Psychosis (DUP) that is feasible for use in community settings. The proposed California network will contribute systematically collected outcomes data on over 100 FEP clients per year, from 12 community and university EP clinics, to enhance the development of a national EP network, supported by the NIMH EPINET program.
Social impairments are core features of schizophrenia that lead to poor outcome. Social skills and competence improve quality of life and protect against stress-related exacerbation of symptoms, while supporting resilience, interpersonal interactions, and social affiliation. To improve outcome, it is necessary to remediate social deficits. Existing psychosocial interventions are moderately effective but the effort-intensive nature (high burden), low adherence, and weak transfer of skills to everyday life present significant hurdles toward recovery. Thus, there is a dire need to develop effective, engaging and low-burden social interventions for people with schizophrenia that will result in better compliance rates and functional outcome. In a previous pilot study, the investigators tested the effectiveness of a novel adaptive virtual reality (VR) intervention in improving targeted social cognitive function (social attention, as indexed by eye scanning patterns) in individuals with schizophrenia. 10 sessions of 1-hour VR intervention were sufficient to engage the target mechanism of social attention and improve negative symptoms. Acceptability and compliance were very high among the participants. ' The next phase, supported by a R33 grant will compare the VR social skills training with a control condition. This new protocol includes a control condition for the exposure to computerized training across the 10 sessions and incidental exposure to social interactions (i.e. interactions with experimenters twice a week for 5 weeks) by including a control condition, which involves computerized brain fitness training for 10 sessions.
Maintaining treatment engagement is critical for first episode psychosis patients to experience gains possible with coordinated specialty care (CSC). This study is designed to identify CSC participants still receiving care but at high risk for disengagement and to intervene to prevent/delay disengagement.
The purpose of this study is to better understand mental illness and will test the hypotheses that while viewing affective stimuli, patient groups will show increased blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) signal by fMRI after lorazepam. This study will enroll participants between the ages of 16 and 60, who have a psychotic illness (such as psychosis which includes conditions like schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, and mood disorders). The study will also enroll eligible participants without any psychiatric illness, to compare their brains. The study will require participants to have 3-4 sessions over a few weeks. The initial assessments (may be over two visits) will include a diagnostic interview and several questionnaires (qols) to assess eligibility. Subsequently, there will will be two separate functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) sessions in which lorazepam or placebo will be given prior to the MRI. During the fMRI the participants will also be asked to answer questions. Additionally, the participants will have their blood drawn, women of child bearing potential will have a urine pregnancy test, vital signs taken, and asked to complete more qols.
Schizophrenia (Schizophrenia,Sc), biphasic affective disorder (Bipolar disorder,BPD), major depression (major depressive disorder,MDD), anxiety disorder (Anxiety disorder,An) and other mental disorders have obvious family aggregation, with heritability of 60 -90%. This kind of common mental illness seriously affects the psychosomatic health and quality of life of patients, and places a great mental and economic burden on the society and family. At present, the diagnosis of mental illness is mainly based on clinical symptoms. With the development of molecular biology, genomics has become a new way to study mental illness. MicroRNA (miRNA) is a class of eukaryotic endogenously non-coding single-stranded RNA, which can regulate gene expression by binding to specific mRNA or regulating the protein translation process of specific mRNA. MiRNA widely exists in plasma and serum, and the type and quantity of miRNA in plasma and serum change with different physiological and disease conditions. It is reported that the expression profile of miRNA in brain tissue of schizophrenia is significantly different from that of normal subjects. In addition, the study found that the specific miRNA detected in peripheral blood can directly reflect the condition of the disease, which may use miRNA in peripheral blood as a clinical biological marker. In order to detect the expression of various miRNA in plasma, high throughput miRNA chip detection has become the first choice for primary screening. In this study, the investigators intend to detect the difference of miRNA expression in peripheral blood of different types of schizophrenia by high throughput miRNA chip, and analyze the correlation between them. It is hoped to provide the basis for the diagnosis and occurrence and development of clinical psychotic patients.