Dr. George Foussias and Dr. Nicole Kozloff co-chaired a symposium at the 2024 Annual Congress of the Schizophrenia International Research Society entitled "Approaches to Improving the Quality of Early Psychosis Intervention Services." Dr. Kozloff presented early findings from the study in a session entitled "Improving outcomes in early psychosis intervention through NAVIGATE implementation: One-year findings of the Ontario “EPI-SET” study." Dr. Aristotle Voineskos acted as a discussant, drawing examples from EPI-SET and engaging the other presenters and audience members in a discussion about advancing EPI services.

On November 13, 14 and 30, 2023, CAMH and Health Standards Ontario will be hosting a series of in-person and virtual workshops to bring together a wide range of stakeholders across Canada to advance practice and policy standards for Early Psychosis Intervention in Canada. With funding from the Standards Council of Canada, the aim of these workshops is to examine, consolidate and expand existing EPI standards by capturing knowledge and recommendations from a wide range of stakeholder perspectives. This information will be used to develop recommendations for standards that serve all youth experiencing early psychosis, no matter where they live in Canada, taking into account their unique circumstances and lived experiences. The collaboration will produce its final report of recommendations at the end of February 2024.

At this year's conference, we heard from speakers across all areas of the project, discussing data, challenges and successes, as well as upcoming plans/future directions. Click the link to watch the presentations.

The 2023 Congress of the Schizophrenia International Research Society (SIRS) was held in Toronto, Canada from May 11-15, 2023. The theme of this conference was Overcoming Global Diversity: Mind and Body Matter.

The second annual NAVIGATE International Conference will be taking place virtually in May 2023. This conference will bring together the experiences of NAVIGATE teams around the world. Day 1: Tuesday, May 2, 2023 9AM - 11AM EST Day 2: Tuesday, May 9, 2022 9AM - 11AM EST Click the button to visit the conference website and watch the presentations.

On Friday, June 24th, we held the EPI-SET Annual Conference 2022. We heard from speakers across all areas of the project, discussing data, challenges and successes, as well as upcoming plans/future directions. Click the button to watch the presentations and download presentation slides.

The first ever NAVIGATE International Conference will be taking place virtually in May 2022. This conference will bring together the experiences of NAVIGATE teams in the USA, Israel, Canada, and China. Day 1: Tuesday, May 10, 2022 from 9AM - 11AM EST Day 2: Tuesday, May 17, 2022 from 9AM - 11AM EST Click the button to visit the conference website and watch the presentations.

Given that EPI services have rapidly transitioned to virtual care with little evidence to guide virtual delivery of EPI, a group from CAMH with many members from the EPI-SET team, including youth and family advisors, have been studying the implementation of NAVIGATE delivered virtually ("e-NAVIGATE"). The e-NAVIGATE team held their first annual meeting in February 2022 to share successes over the past year, including: 1. Analyzing responses from Qualitative Interviews with patients and family members to learn more about their experiences of receiving virtual care; 2. Analyzing responses from a Focus Group with clinicians to understand their experiences of delivering virtual care; 3. Exploring facilitators and barriers associated with delivering virtual care through the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR) Interviews; 4. Sharing results from fidelity assessments, which examined adherence to EPI standards following the transition to virtual care compared with in-person delivery; 5. Examining data from the Virtual Client Experience Surveys and Virtual Provider Experience Surveys to understand the overall satisfaction and acceptability of virtual care; and 6. Extracting data from electronic medical records to examine the factors that affect service engagement, including healthy equity factors, within a virtual setting. The study team is continuing to develop knowledge translation strategies, which will include conference presentations, informational webinars for patients, families, and providers, and a manual outlining how to deliver NAVIGATE virtually.

ABSTRACT: While early psychosis intervention (EPI) has proliferated in recent years amid evidence of its effectiveness, programmes often struggle to deliver consistent, recovery-based care. NAVIGATE is a manualised model of EPI with demonstrated effectiveness consisting of four components: individualised medication management, individual resiliency training, supported employment and education and family education. We aim to implement NAVIGATE in geographically diverse EPI programmes in Ontario, Canada, evaluating implementation and its effect on fidelity to the EPI model, as well as individual-level outcomes (patient/family member-reported and interviewer-rated), system-level outcomes (captured in provincial administrative databases) and engagement of participants with lived experience. Methods and analysis: This is a multisite, non-randomised pragmatic hybrid effectiveness-implementation type III mixed methods study coordinated at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto. Implementation is supported by the Provincial System Support Program, a CAMH-based programme with provincial offices across Ontario, and Extension of Community Healthcare Outcomes Ontario Mental Health at CAMH and the University of Toronto. The primary outcome is fidelity to the EPI model as measured using the First Episode Psychosis Services-Fidelity Scale. Four hundred participants in the EPI programmes will be recruited and followed using both individual-level assessments and health administrative data for 2 years following NAVIGATE initiation. People with lived experience will be engaged in all aspects of the project, including through youth and family advisory committees. Ethics and dissemination: Research ethics board approval has been obtained from CAMH and institutions overseeing the local EPI programmes. Study findings will be reported in scientific journal articles and shared with key stakeholders including youth, family members, programme staff and policymakers.