NYS Researchers to Lead NIMH Research Teams to Test Approaches to Altering the Course of Schizophrenia

ALBANY, NY (07/21/2009)(readMedia)-- Michael F. Hogan, Ph.D., Commissioner of the New York State Office of Mental Health (OMH), today announced that researchers in New York State will head the two independent teams selected by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) to develop and test new therapeutic strategies for treating people experiencing a first episode of the psychotic symptoms of schizophrenia. The Recovery After an Initial Schizophrenia Episode (RAISE) project is based on the premise that early intervention with optimized treatments and services can alter the course of the illness and reduce disability while increasing recovery.

The research teams will be headed by:

• Jeffrey A. Lieberman, M.D., Lawrence E. Kolb Professor and Chairman, Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; Director, New York State Psychiatric Institute; and Director, Lieber Center for Schizophrenia Research. Dr. Lieberman will lead a team of researchers from the University of Maryland, Dartmouth College, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), Duke University, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, University of California Davis, and Harvard University Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
• John M. Kane, M.D., Chairman, Department of Psychiatry at The Zucker Hillside Hospital of the North Shore- Long Island Jewish Health System and Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology and Neuroscience and the Dr. E. Richard Feinberg Chair in Schizophrenia Research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Dr. Kane will lead a team of researchers from SUNY Downstate Medical School, Dartmouth College, University of North Carolina, Weill Cornell Medical College, Yale University and the University of Calgary.

Commissioner Hogan said, "All New Yorkers can be proud that both teams involved in this intensive effort to forestall the disability associated with schizophrenia will be led by researchers in New York State. New approaches to the treatment of schizophrenia will be tested, emphasizing aggressive interventions as early as possible. These new approaches are aimed at helping people and their families to live with the illness and successfully transition to adult life. The Office of Mental Health intends to use the findings of these projects to help transform the care for all New Yorkers with serious mental illness."

Dr. Lieberman said, "This award will enable researchers to demonstrate how a strategically timed intervention at the onset of symptoms can prevent the debilitating effects of one of humankind's most devastating and costly mental disorders."

Dr. Kane said, "We are very pleased to have this opportunity to work with colleagues, families and individuals with schizophrenia to develop and test a comprehensive early treatment program that can not only alter the course of this potentially devastating illness, but also change the way that it is perceived."

"This new initiative will help us determine whether intervention that is started early, incorporates diverse treatment and rehabilitation approaches, and is sustained over time, can make it possible for more people with schizophrenia to return successfully to work and school," said NIMH Director Thomas R. Insel, M.D. "Moreover, the interventions being tested will be designed from the outset to be readily adopted in real world health care settings and quickly put into place."

"Depending on the study's outcome, RAISE could help set the stage for a paradigm shift in the way schizophrenia is treated in the United States," said Robert Heinssen, Ph.D., acting director of the NIMH division of Services and Intervention Research and project officer for RAISE. "The ultimate goal of the initiative is to eliminate the chronic form of schoziphrenia that is so costly and devastating to the individual, family members, and society as a whole. This Recovery Act-supported project will hire and help train many mental health researchers and care providers for a project that is likely to help some of our most vulnerable citizens lead more productive and satisfying lives."

Affecting just over one percent of the adult population, schizophrenia is often thought of as the most serious and intractable mental illness. Schizophrenia often strikes in the college or early adult years, and although many experience a substantial recovery, many others experience substantial and lifelong disability. People with schizophrenia often do not receive treatment until the disease is already well-established, with recurrent episodes of psychosis resulting is costly multiple hospitalizations and disabilities that can last for decades. People with the illness are over-represented on disability rolls, and among the homeless and imprisoned. Their unemployment rate is more than 70 percent, and the lifetime suicide rate for people with the disease is over ten percent. People with schizophrenia occupy approximately 25 percent of the nation's hospital beds.

A number of research projects internationally have signaled that early intervention-combining medical treatment with consumer and family education, and emphasizing a transition to a productive adult life-holds great promise in reducing the disability that is associated with schizophrenia.

A RAISE project page is available on the NIMH website, and will provide news, updates, and related information about the project on an ongoing basis.

The RAISE project is being funded by NIMH with additional support from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. RAISE is a model example of how money from the Recovery Act can accelerate science related to public health problems and potentially benefit those most in need.