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A prognostic model for predicting functional impairment in youth mental health services

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 December 2024

Frank Iorfino*
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
Rafael Oliveira
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia Data61, CSIRO, Sydney, NSW Australia
Sally Cripps
Affiliation:
Human Technology Institute, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW Australia School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
Roman Marchant
Affiliation:
Human Technology Institute, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW Australia School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
Mathew Varidel
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
William Capon
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
Jacob J. Crouse
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
Ante Prodan
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia Translational Health Research Institute, Western Sydney University, Sydney, NSW Australia School of Computer, Data and Mathematical Sciences, Western Sydney University, Sydney, NSW Australia
Elizabeth M. Scott
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
Jan Scott
Affiliation:
Academic Psychiatry, Institute of Neuroscience, Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK
Ian B. Hickie
Affiliation:
Brain and Mind Centre, The University of Sydney, Camperdown, NSW Australia
*
Corresponding author: Frank Iorfino; Email: frank.iorfino@sydney.edu.au

Abstract

Background

Functional impairment is a major concern among those presenting to youth mental health services and can have a profound impact on long-term outcomes. Early recognition and prevention for those at risk of functional impairment is essential to guide effective youth mental health care. Yet, identifying those at risk is challenging and impacts the appropriate allocation of indicated prevention and early intervention strategies.

Methods

We developed a prognostic model to predict a young person’s social and occupational functional impairment trajectory over 3 months. The sample included 718 young people (12–25 years) engaged in youth mental health care. A Bayesian random effects model was designed using demographic and clinical factors and model performance was evaluated on held-out test data via 5-fold cross-validation.

Results

Eight factors were identified as the optimal set for prediction: employment, education, or training status; self-harm; psychotic-like experiences; physical health comorbidity; childhood-onset syndrome; illness type; clinical stage; and circadian disturbances. The model had an acceptable area under the curve (AUC) of 0.70 (95% CI, 0.56–0.81) overall, indicating its utility for predicting functional impairment over 3 months. For those with good baseline functioning, it showed excellent performance (AUC = 0.80, 0.67–0.79) for identifying individuals at risk of deterioration.

Conclusions

We developed and validated a prognostic model for youth mental health services to predict functional impairment trajectories over a 3-month period. This model serves as a foundation for further tool development and demonstrates its potential to guide indicated prevention and early intervention for enhancing functional outcomes or preventing functional decline.

Information

Type
Research Article
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that no alterations are made and the original article is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained prior to any commercial use and/or adaptation of the article.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of European Psychiatric Association
Figure 0

Figure 1. An overview of the predictive model. An individual’s clinical and demographic characteristics serve as inputs to the cluster assignment model, which predicts the probabilities of whether an individual’s score is going to remain the same, improve, or deteriorate. Combined with the cluster’s prediction, the individual’s initial score informs a trajectory prediction model which predicts an individual’s response over time. The magenta crosses indicate the actual scores given by clinicians. Note that the trajectory model is only informed of the individual’s initial score at baseline, and not the score at their second visit, which the model must predict.

Figure 1

Table 1. Baseline characteristics of the sample selected for the analysis (N = 718)

Figure 2

Figure 2. Model performance metrics and AUC. Panel A presents results for the overall model predicting whether an individual’s SOFAS score would significantly drop by 10 points over the course of 3 months. Panel B presents results for the model predicting functional impairment at the next consultation for individuals with initially good functioning (SOFAS above 70). Abbreviations: NPV, negative predictive value; PPV, positive predictive value.

Figure 3

Table 2. Baseline characteristics of typical individuals in each cluster

Figure 4

Table 3. Factors that influence a drop in SOFAS score to below 70 at the next visit to the clinics given different initial score levels

Figure 5

Figure 3. Model outputs for an individual who improved over the course of 3 months (Panel A), and for another individual who deteriorated over the course of 3 months (Panel B). The “cluster” graph shows the probability of each change cluster (“constant,” “up,” and “down”) for both individuals. The “predicted trajectories” graph shows the simulated trajectories based on the cluster model and the individuals initial score (~50 for the person in panel A and ~60 for the person in panel B). “Up” trajectories are shaded green, “constant” trajectories are shaded red, and “down” trajectories are shaded blue. The dotted black line and cross show the actual observed trajectory and SOFAS score for both individuals over the follow-up period.

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