Early intervention in psychosis (EIP) services improve outcomes for young people, but approximately 30% disengage.

To test whether a new motivational engagement intervention would prolong engagement and whether it was cost-effective.

We conducted a multicentre, single-blind, parallel-group, cluster randomised controlled trial involving 20 EIP teams at five UK National Health Service (NHS) sites. Teams were randomised using permuted blocks stratified by NHS trust. Participants were all young people (aged 14–35 years) presenting with a first episode of psychosis between May 2019 and July 2020 (N = 1027). We compared the novel Early Youth Engagement (EYE-2) intervention plus standardised EIP (sEIP) with sEIP alone. The primary outcome was time to disengagement over 12–26 months. Economic outcomes were mental health costs, societal costs and socio-occupational outcomes over 12 months. Assessors were masked to treatment allocation for primary disengagement and cost-effectiveness outcomes. Analysis followed intention-to-treat principles. The trial was registered at ISRCTN51629746.

Disengagement was low at 15.9% overall in standardised stand-alone services. The adjusted hazard ratio for EYE-2 + sEIP (n = 652) versus sEIP alone (n = 375) was 1.07 (95% CI 0.76–1.49; P = 0.713). The health economic evaluation indicated lower mental healthcare costs linked to reductions in unplanned mental healthcare with no compromise of clinical outcomes, as well as some evidence for lower societal costs and more days in education, training, employment and stable accommodation in the EYE-2 group.

We found no evidence that EYE-2 increased time to disengagement, but there was some evidence for its cost-effectiveness. This is the largest study to date reporting positive engagement, health and cost outcomes in a total EIP population sample. Limitations included high loss to follow-up for secondary outcomes and low completion of societal and socio-occupational data. COVID-19 affected fidelity and implementation. Future engagement research should target engagement to those in greatest need, including in-patients and those with socio-occupational goals.

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) conducts early health technology assessment (HTA) of new medicines on behalf of NHSScotland. Assessment of end-of-life (EoL), orphan, and ultra-orphan medicines includes a process to gather evidence from patients and carers during Patient and Clinician Engagement (PACE) meetings. The output of PACE meetings is a consensus statement describing the medicine’s added value from the perspective of patients/carers and clinicians. The PACE statement is used by SMC committee members in decision making. This study compared how PACE participants and SMC committee members rate the importance of information in PACE statements for these medicines.

A survey was undertaken of patient group (PG) representatives and clinicians who participated in PACE meetings, and SMC committee members.

PACE participants who responded (26 PG representatives and 14 clinicians) rated health benefits and ability to take part in normal life as important/very important. Convenience of administration and treatment choice received the lowest rating. Hope for the future received the most diverse response. PACE participants generally rated the importance of quality of life themes higher than committee members (n = 20) but the rank order was similar. Differences between the proportion of PACE participants and committee members who rated themes as important/very important were greatest for treatment choice and hope for the future.

In general, PACE themes and subthemes that were rated highly by PACE participants were also considered important by SMC committee members, indicating that information captured during PACE meetings is relevant when making decisions on EoL, orphan, and ultra-orphan medicines.

Psychiatric mother and baby units (MBUs) are recommended for severe perinatal mental illness, but effectiveness compared with other forms of acute care remains unknown.

We hypothesised that women admitted to MBUs would be less likely to be readmitted to acute care in the 12 months following discharge, compared with women admitted to non-MBU acute care (generic psychiatric wards or crisis resolution teams (CRTs)).

Quasi-experimental cohort study of women accessing acute psychiatric care up to 1 year postpartum in 42 healthcare organisations across England and Wales. Primary outcome was readmission within 12 months post-discharge. Propensity scores were used to account for systematic differences between MBU and non-MBU participants. Secondary outcomes included assessment of cost-effectiveness, experience of services, unmet needs, perceived bonding, observed mother–infant interaction quality and safeguarding outcome.

Of 279 women, 108 (39%) received MBU care, 62 (22%) generic ward care and 109 (39%) CRT care only. The MBU group (n = 105) had similar readmission rates to the non-MBU group (n = 158) (aOR = 0.95, 95% CI 0.86–1.04, P = 0.29; an absolute difference of −5%, 95% CI −14 to 4%). Service satisfaction was significantly higher among women accessing MBUs compared with non-MBUs; no significant differences were observed for any other secondary outcomes.

We found no significant differences in rates of readmission, but MBU advantage might have been masked by residual confounders; readmission will also depend on quality of care after discharge and type of illness. Future studies should attempt to identify the effective ingredients of specialist perinatal in-patient and community care to improve outcomes.

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) conducts early health technology assessment (HTA) of new medicines on behalf of NHSScotland. Evidence from patients and carers on end-of-life and orphan medicines is gathered during Patient and Clinician Engagement (PACE) meetings. The output is a consensus statement describing a medicine's added value from the perspective of patients/carers and clinicians, which is used by SMC committee members in decision-making. This study compared the importance of factors in the PACE statement to PACE participants and committee members.

A survey of ninety-eight PACE participants (consisting of forty-two patient group (PG) representatives and fifty-six clinicians) investigated the importance of quality of life (QoL) themes (family/carer impact, health benefits, tolerability, psychological benefit, hope, normal life, treatment choice and convenience) identified from an earlier thematic analysis of PACE statements. The findings from PG representatives and clinicians were compared, and the overall results were further compared with those from a previous survey of committee members (n = 26).

Among PACE participants who responded (twenty-six PG representatives and fourteen clinicians), 100 percent rated ‘health benefits’ and ‘ability to take part in normal life’ as important / very important. ‘Convenience of administration’ and ‘treatment choice’ received the lowest rating with fifteen percent and nineteen percent respectively of PG representatives versus seven percent of clinicians rating each as very important. ‘Hope for the future’ received the most diverse response with fifty-eight percent of PG representatives and fourteen of clinicians rating this as very important.

In general, PACE participants rated importance of QoL themes higher than committee members (n = 21) but the rank order was similar. Differences between the proportion of PACE participants and committee members who rated themes important/very important was greatest for ‘treatment choice’ (sixty-seven percent versus twenty percent respectively) and ‘hope for the future’ (eighty-two percent versus fifty-three percent).

The findings demonstrate some alignment between PACE participants’ and committee members’ responses, supporting the value of the PACE output in decision-making. Areas for further research are highlighted.

To examine the relationship between a posteriori dietary patterns in early childhood and alcohol consumption in adolescence.

Data were obtained from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) prospective cohort study. Dietary information was obtained using FFQ at the age of 3 and 7 years. The association between dietary patterns, derived using principal components analysis and the Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) scores (to assess harmful intake) and frequency of alcohol consumption at the age of 17 years were examined. Secondary analysis considered sugar intake as a percentage of total energy intake.

Women who gave birth between 1 April 1991 and 31 December 1992 in the Avon area in southwest England were eligible for the ALSPAC cohort study.

Totally, 14 541 pregnancies were enrolled in ALSPAC during its initial recruitment phase. For this analysis, complete data were available for between 3148 and 3520 participants.

Adherence to the ‘healthy’ dietary pattern at both 3 and 7 years of age was positively associated with consuming more than one alcoholic drink per week at 17 years of age, whilst adherence to the ‘traditional’ dietary pattern at both ages was protective of harmful alcohol intake at 17 years of age. Sugar intake was not associated with either alcohol outcome after adjustment for ethnicity, maternal level of education, parental social class and maternal AUDIT score.

For the population studied, changes to diet in early childhood are unlikely to have an impact on harmful alcohol use in adolescence given the lack of consistency across the results.

The placebo response in depression clinical trials is a major contributing factor for failure to establish the efficacy of novel and repurposed treatments. However, it is not clear as to what the placebo response in treatment-resistant depression (TRD) patients is or whether it differs across treatment modalities. Our objective was to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of the magnitude of the placebo response in TRD patients across different treatment modalities and its possible moderators.

Searches were conducted on MEDLINE and PsychInfo from inception to January 24, 2020. Only studies that recruited TRD patients and randomization to a placebo (or sham) arm in a pharmacotherapy, brain stimulation, or psychotherapy study were included (PROSPERO 2020 CRD42020190465). The primary outcome was the Hedges’ g for the reported depression scale using a random-effects model. Secondary outcomes included moderators assessed via meta-regression and response and remission rate. Heterogeneity was evaluated using the Egger's Test and a funnel plot. Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool was used to estimate risks.

46 studies met our inclusion criteria involving a total of 3083 participants (mean (SD) age: 45.7 (6.2); female: 52.4%). The pooled placebo effect for all modalities was large (N = 3083, g = 1.08 ,95% CI [0.95-1.20)I 2 = 0.1). The placebo effect in studies of specific treatment modalities did not significantly differ: oral medications g = 1.14 (95%CI:0.99-1.29); parenteral medications g = 1.32 (95%CI:0.59-2.04); ayahuasca g = 0.47 (95%CI:-0.28-1.17); rTMS g = 0.93 (95%CI:0.63-1.23); tDCS g = 1.32 (95%CI:0.52-2.11); invasive brain stimulation g = 1.06 (95%CI:0.64-1.47). There were no psychotherapy trials that met our eligibility criteria. Similarly, response and remission rates were comparable across modalities. Heterogeneity was large. Two variables predicted a lager placebo effect: open-label prospective design (B:0.32, 95%CI: 0.05-0.58; p:0.02) and sponsoring by a pharmaceutical or medical device company (B:0.39, 95%CI:0.13-0.65, p:0.004)). No risk of publication bias was found.

The overall placebo effect in TRD studies was large (g = 1.08) and did not differ among treatment modalities. A better understanding of the placebo response in TRD will require: standardizing the definition of TRD, head-to-head comparisons of treatment modalities, an assessment of patient expectations and experiences, and standardized reporting of outcomes.

This study evaluated a pilot psychiatry summer school for GCSE students in terms of participant experience, effects on attitudes to mental illness and perception of psychiatry as a career option. This was done using the Community Attitudes towards the Mentally Ill scale, career choice questionnaires and a discussion group following the week-long programme attended by 26 students.

Students were significantly more likely to choose psychiatry after the summer school (P = 0.01). There were statistically significant changes in scores for social restrictiveness (P = 0.04) and community mental health ideology (P = 0.02). Qualitative analysis generated four themes: variation in expectations, limited prior knowledge, perception of the summer school itself and uniformly positive attitudes to psychiatry after the summer school.

Targeting students at this early stage appears to be an underexplored positive intervention for improving both attitudes towards mental illness and recruitment to psychiatry.

The Scottish Medicines Consortium (SMC) advises NHS Scotland on the clinical and cost-effectiveness of new medicines. Since 2014, evidence from patients and carers on end-of-life and orphan medicines has been gathered during Patient and Clinician Engagement (PACE) meetings. The output is a consensus statement which describes the added value of a new medicine from the perspective of the patient/carer and clinician. This study investigates the importance of factors identified through PACE to committee members and how these are used in their decision-making.

Survey methodology was used to gain an understanding of the factors from the PACE statement that are most likely to influence members (n = 26) in decision-making. The survey instrument was informed by a literature review and observation of PACE and SMC meetings. Likert scale questions were used to determine the relative importance of factors in the PACE statement, including information relating to eight prominent ‘quality of life’ themes (family/carer impact, health benefits, tolerability, psychological benefit, hope, normal life, treatment choice and convenience), that were identified by an earlier thematic analysis of these statements.

Analysis of survey responses will use mainly descriptive techniques to generate percentages and ranges. Correlation analysis will be considered to investigate relationships between members’ demographics, type of medicine (end-of-life, orphan) and the importance of different factors in the PACE statement. Preliminary results indicate that key quality of life themes highly valued by patients/carers are also important to committee members in their decision making. Challenges in assimilating qualitative patient-based evidence from PACE alongside quantitative clinical and economic data were highlighted.

Findings from this survey will provide valuable insight into how PACE evidence is used by SMC decision makers alongside traditional clinical and economic evidence and will help shape future improvements to the PACE methodology.