Enhancing Educational and Vocational Recovery in Adolescents and Young Adults With Early Psychosis Through Supported Employment and Education. (SEEearly)

Charité University Medicine Berlin

Status: Enrolling

Conditions: Persistent Delusional Disorder; Unspecified Nonorganic Psychosis; Schizophrenia; Other Nonorganic Psychotic Disorders; Acute and Transient Psychotic Disorder, Unspecified; Schizoaffective Disorder

Treatments: Other: Individual Placement and Support (IPS)

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT05824117

DRKS00029660 (Registry Identifier)

470569697

Details and patient eligibility

About

Psychotic disorders often develop a chronic course with devastating consequences for individuals, families, and societies usually with first onset during adolescence and early adulthood. Early intervention programs, which provide intensive, phase specific, psychosocial, and pharmacological treatment for people in the first five years after the initial psychotic episode (early psychosis) can significantly improve the outcome and are therefore strongly recommended in national and international guidelines. However, most early intervention programs in people with early psychosis still focus on improving symptoms and relapse prevention, rather than targeting educational and vocational recovery, although engagement in work and education is a high priority for young people with early psychosis and reduces the social disability associated with the disorder. The aim of the present study is to explore the effects of Supported Employment and Education (SEE) following the Individual Placement and Support (IPS) model in people with early psychosis. The investigators compare treatment as usual (TAU) in an outpatient psychiatric setting to TAU plus SEE.

Enrollment: 184 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 16 to 35 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• clinical diagnosis of early psychosis (DSM 5: schizophrenia spectrum and other psychotic disorders (297.1, 298.8, 295.4, 295.9, 295.7, 298.8, 298.9) within the last 5 years currently treated as outpatients
• sufficient linguistic and intellectual abilities to take part in the study
• interest in competitive employment or/and mainstream education
• written informed consent

Exclusion criteria

• Learning disability or mental retardation as well as insufficient German language abilities (< A2)
• physical or organic handicap that seriously impede work or educational functioning

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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184 participants in 2 patient groups

Intervention Group (TAU+SEE)

Experimental group

Description:

The experimental intervention is treatment as usual (TAU) for adolescents and young adults with early psychosis in the respective recruitment centers for 12 months plus Supported Employment and Education following the Individual Placement and Support model.

Treatment:

Other: Individual Placement and Support (IPS)

Control Group (TAU)

No Intervention group

Description:

The control condition is treatment as usual (TAU) for adolescents and young adults with early psychosis in the respective recruitment centers for 12 months (including medical review, pharmacological treatment, and psychosocial support: group programs and social counseling to external government-funded vocational programs).