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Published on: November 21, 2013
Untreated illness and recovery in clients of an early psychosis intervention program: a 10-year prospective cohort
Gina Bhullar1,2, Ross M G Norman1,2,3, Neil Klar1
1Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, The University of Western Ontario, 1151 Richmond Street, Kresge Building, London, ON, N6A 5C1, Canada.
Purpose:
To investigate whether duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) and duration of untreated illness (DUI) are associated with measures of both subjective and objective recovery 10 years after a first episode of psychosis.
Methods:
A cohort of 65 clients from an early psychosis intervention program completed a battery of outcome measures 10 years following initial treatment for first-episode psychosis (FEP). The outcomes of interest were self-perceived recovery scores (Maryland Assessment of Recovery in People with Serious Mental Illness Scale) and occupational activity, defined as engagement in work and/or school on a full/part-time basis. Multiple linear and logistic regression analyses were used to estimate the associations between DUP and DUI with each measure of recovery, adjusting for potential confounding factors.
Results:
We did not find a statistically significant association between DUP and either occupational activity (OR = 1.26, 95% CI 0.81-1.95) or self-perceived recovery score (β = - 0.73, 95% CI - 2.42 to 0.97). However, we found a significant negative association between DUI and self-perceived recovery score (β = - 0.52, 95% CI - 0.87 to - 0.16).
Conclusions:
Our findings suggest that DUI may have a stronger influence than DUP on recovery from FEP at 10-year follow-up. This suggests the potential value in targeted interventions for people with a long DUI to increase the likelihood of achieving recovery after the first episode of psychosis.
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