# Development and testing of a caregiver-facing mobile health intervention to reduce duration of untreated psychosis

> **NIH NIH R34** · UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON · 2022 · $233,250

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY / ABSTRACT
 Early intervention for young adults experiencing early psychosis significantly improves long-term
functional trajectory. However, a long duration of untreated illness significantly reduces the impact of treatment.
Caregivers often play a pivotal role in treatment-seeking, making first contact with providers, persuading the
affected relative to make such contacts, or ensuring that the affected individual remains engaged in care.
However, caregivers often lack accurate information about psychosis, treatments and recovery, or feel
overwhelmed and unable to help or communicate with their affected relative. During this period, they are
especially vulnerable to problematic or counterproductive appraisals of illness, for example, catastrophizing
beliefs, or self- or patient-blaming attributions. The cognitive model of caregiving argues that negative family
interactions can worsen symptoms and functioning while impeding help-seeking. Specialized family
interventions improve outcomes for caregivers and affected young adults, but these interventions are provided
to EP families in which the affected young adult has already presented to treatment. Thus, caregivers of
untreated young adults with EP – arguably the individuals at greatest risk for poor outcomes – lack access to
the services they need. Caregivers often turn to online resources for more information and social support. Early
work examining web-based platforms has demonstrated that digital health technologies are feasible,
acceptable, and have potential to improve caregivers’ psychosis-related knowledge and appraisals. Mobile
health interventions are particularly well-suited to this task, as they can provide individualized, real-time, real-
place support. It remains unclear at present, however, whether and how remotely delivered mHealth can be
leveraged to increase engagement in treatment for young adults with EP.
 The proposed research project aims to develop and test an mHealth intervention designed to improve
caregivers’ illness knowledge and caregiving skills through interactive cognitive-behavioral modules, and
through these improvements, reduce distress, improve coping, improve family communication, increase
caregiver treatment facilitation and reduce duration of untreated psychosis. This proposal will involve (1) needs
assessment and user co-design sessions with EP caregivers to understand their needs, interests and
preferences in a caregiver-facing mHealth intervention, (2) a one-week usability field trial of this new
intervention to determine feasibility and functionality, and (3) a remote pilot randomized controlled trial
comparing this new intervention to existing online caregiving support resources. Analyses will determine
whether this approach is acceptable and feasible, as well as explore its effectiveness and impact on key
components of the cognitive model of caregiving.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10447651
- **Project number:** 5R34MH124878-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
- **Principal Investigator:** Benjamin Edwards Buck
- **Activity code:** R34 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $233,250
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2021-07-08 → 2024-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10447651

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10447651, Development and testing of a caregiver-facing mobile health intervention to reduce duration of untreated psychosis (5R34MH124878-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-27 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10447651. Licensed CC0.

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