Using a “whole body, whole lifespan” approach, we will investigate how alterations in the immune and endocrine systems induced by prenatal alcohol exposure may be key drivers of early-onset health and functional deficits in adults with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders.
Suicide is a leading cause of death among 10-to-24-year-olds. Primary Care (PC) often serves as a trusted resource for adolescents and young adults (AYA) and their families; and routine wellness visits provide important opportunities for early detection of suicide risk. Importantly, nearly half of those who die by suicide contact their PC clinic within one […]
This project aims to partner with rural, urban, and suburban pediatric primary care practices in Western Washington to improve access and effectiveness of suicide prevention programs through adapting the SAFETY-A intervention for use in primary care settings. This project has the following aims: (1) assess needs of primary care staff, patients, and parents/caregivers for suicide […]
The purpose of this study is to develop and evaluate a new online program called ASSIST – Alcohol-focused Support of Survivors In Sororities Training. The training is designed to help sorority members learn how to support friends who have had an unwanted sexual experience, both during the initial discussion of the experience and when navigating […]
Death by suicide is the 2nd leading cause of death among young adults in the United States. While most patients who die by suicide have had recent contact with their health care providers, the medical delivery system is poorly equipped to address this preventable issue. EMA (ecological momentary assessment) systems show promise as indicators of […]
With the rise in opioid use disorder (OUD) and overdose, racialized disparities in buprenorphine access and use are a significant concern nationally—studies estimate that Black patients with OUD are 50-60% less likely to access buprenorphine compared to White patients, and similar disparities have also been observed for Hispanic/Latinx patients. COVID-19-related policy changes increased flexibility in […]
The purpose of this multi-site study is to develop and evaluate a multi-phase implementation and sustainment strategy to support evidence-based practice use across different interventions for individuals with autism, settings, and ages. *In partnership with UCLA, UC Davis, Rochester, Penn, Drexel, and Kansas
We have developed – and are currently conducting a large-scale randomized trial of – at teacher-focused version of the Beliefs and Attitudes for Successful Implementation in Schools (BASIS) implementation strategy. BASIS-T is being tested in context of Positive Greetings at the Door (PGD) implementation. Details are available in a study protocol published in Implementation Science.
The Canoe Journey study is an exploratory study aimed at examining the acceptability and fit of motivational interviewing (MI) and dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) among American Indian and Alaska Native youth and young adult Canoe Journey participants. The team will develop a list of MI and DBT approaches in collaboration with Canoe Journey partners, and […]
citiesRISE is a global platform committed to transforming the state of mental health policy and practice in cities and beyond to meet the mental health needs of populations across the world. To achieve significant, measurable improvements in mental health – especially among young people – citiesRISE is scaling up proven methodologies and tools and harnessing […]
Los Angeles Maternal Mental Health Access (LAMMHA) is a five year program (2022 – 2027) funded by The California Health Care Foundation (CHCF) to support health centers in Los Angeles to identify and treat common perinatal mental disorders (CPMD) and reduce the risk of suicide. The LAMMHA initiative is a collaboration between Community Clinic Association of Los Angeles […]
The aim of the project is to conduct a pragmatic pilot trial of a CIH-based stepped care approach v. treatment as usual in two primary care settings (one rural and one urban). The pilot trial will focus on feasibility, acceptability, and appropriateness for providers and patients (e.g., randomization, retention, and treatment satisfaction) of the stepped […]
This project examines changes in young adult substance use, related health risk behaviors, and substance use-related risk factors from before to during the COVID-19 pandemic among young adults in WA state (where alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis sales and use are legal for adults age 21 and over) using the accelerated longitudinal cohort sequential data from […]
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is one of the most effective antidepressant non-invasive brain stimulation therapies for adults with major depression. However, a number of patients fail to respond despite adequate trials, and while clinically beneficial, ECT can produce adverse cognitive effects including amnesia, executive dysfunction, and verbal dysfluency. In this prospective study, we propose the first […]
Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is characterized by maladaptive self-focused attention (SFA), which itself is correlated with large scale brain network connectivity impairments. Cannabis use disorder (CUD) is commonly conceptualized as impaired reward processing within the ventral dopaminergic network, however, it is also implicated in connectivity disturbances in other critical cortical circuits. In the current study […]
Fentanyl abuse has reached epidemic proportions in the United States and is responsible for more than 70,000 overdose deaths each year. Avoidance of significant physical and emotional turmoil during withdrawal and exposure to drug-associated cues are two key deterrents to voluntary abstinence in those suffering from substance abuse disorder. By investigating the localized neuronal projections […]
Alcohol use disorder (AUD) frequently results in serious illness, injuries, and hospitalizations. Surviving illness or injuries related to alcohol use can motivate behavior change that could be harnessed through treatment engagement for AUD in the hospital; however, in general hospital settings, patients are rarely presented with more than a piece of paper with phone numbers […]
The objective of this project is to leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) to create COACH: an on-device AI-driven digital navigator system that will support patients’ effective use of Digital Mental Health Technologies. We aim to: 1. Develop a prototype chatbot-based digital navigator; 2. Conduct preliminary evaluation of the system including lab-based usability testing with healthy participants […]
This project outlines a comprehensive two-year initiative aimed at enhancing suicide care services in primary care settings. The project addresses a critical gap in the continuum of care by providing interim crisis support for at-risk patients who are waiting to be connected to specialty mental health. The main objectives of this project are to develop […]
This project aims to evaluate LLMs’ bias and accuracy in conveying the causes of mental health disorders (e.g., anxiety). We will address the absence of related data and the challenge of annotating data by responsibly collecting human-LLM conversations about mental health advice and working with domain experts to create fact sheets about mental health conditions’ […]
The objective of the project is to evaluate the implementation and impact of the Acute Pain Services Expansion Program (APSEP), an expansion of the independent and formal set of services that provide comprehensive inpatient pain management consultative services and is designed to meet perioperative care needs of veterans receiving inpatient pain management.
This PTSD-focused methods-development EEG project aims to develop new tools for a) predicting PTSD treatment response, b) understanding the underlying biological process, and c) supporting the development of new treatments for PSTD. We are using an event-related potential (ERP) paradigm to develop non-invasive, easily implemented in clinic biomarker to provide useful information about the neurobiology […]
The GATHER initiative aims to: 1) Coordinate a national research network to support tribally led research on etiology and prevention of overdose, substance use, mental health, and pain management. 2) Provide administrative support and shared resources to facilitate the successful completion of N CREW research projects. 3) Provide an administrative infrastructure, intellectual environment, and access […]
We developed a behavioral intervention that seeks to support healthy lifestyles among Veterans by harnessing their social support networks called HealthyTogether. This trial has several aims: 1) Test whether HealthyTogether results in greater weight loss than usual care at six months among Veterans (primary); 2) Examine differences between HealthyTogether and usual care groups in secondary […]
Our project will seek to identify factors associated with gaps in transitions of care for psychiatric inpatients who presented with substance-induced psychosis (SIP) for the first time. We will analyze historical electronic health record data of patients who were treated for psychosis at Harborview Medical Center. We will test the hypotheses that (1) treatment with […]
The purpose of this project is to test the effects of BASIS-T (Beliefs and Attitudes to Support Implementation in Schools – Teachers) on the implementation and student outcomes of evidence-based prevention programs (EBPP) via a hybrid type 3 implementation-effectiveness trial. Failing to address individual-level motivational factors of implementers is especially costly, as individual behavior change […]
Hundreds of millions of people are already using Large Language Models (LLMs), including for mental health purposes, which has led to inadvertent harms. Critically, people with mental health conditions may be especially vulnerable to such harms. In this project, we will develop the first computational framework to systematically quantify and benchmark the risks that LLMs […]
Schizophrenia is a common and devastating neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by genetic heterogeneity. In this project, genes that are disrupted by rare, damaging mutations in individuals with schizophrenia will be evaluated using CRISPRi in iPSCs. Cell lines will be evaluated for phenotypes relevant to schizophrenia. A patient-derived iPSC line will be created that harbors a mutation […]
This project aims to develop a clinical scaffolding system to enhance telemental health care by providing real-time coaching and actionable suggestions during video-based sessions. Modeled after live supervision methodologies, it supports clinicians by identifying intervention targets and offering text-based coaching prompts to guide care. Unlike automated chatbots, this approach enables clinicians to adapt suggestions to […]
This project seeks to compare the effectiveness of the Parent-Child Assistance Program (PCAP) to services as usual in the state of Oklahoma using a randomized, controlled design.
PTSD is one of the most common mental health conditions affecting Veterans and is associated with significant burden. Highly effective treatments exist for PTSD, evidence-based psychotherapies, but very few Veterans receive them. Although VA has trained over 8,500 providers in evidence-based psychotherapies for PTSD over the past 10 years, only 6% of the 650,000 VHA […]
Project includes activities surrounding the provision of evaluation, training, and consultation services to PHSKC. These include developing, conducting and analyzing a needs assessment for mental health providers and agency leads to further refine a tier 2/3 model of care. Training and consultation supports will be provided.
Project includes the design and development of survey instruments for the provider-level skills and agency-level readiness needs assessment and analyzing the data.
The co-occurrence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and hazardous drinking (HD) can be particularly devastating; though evidence-based treatments exist, many individuals with this co-occurrence drop out from or do not or cannot access specialty care. Text-messaging is a mode of intervention delivery that is low-cost, low-burden, and accessible to most people; development and testing of […]
Project SARAH is a randomized clinical trial providing treatment for PTSD and alcohol use in the first year following sexual assault for individuals who identify as female. The study aims to test 1) the role of fear and reward in recovery following sexual assault; 2) the efficacy of a PTSD vs an alcohol intervention for […]
Schizophrenia is a prevalent, debilitating psychiatric disorder that is diagnosed based on clinical interviews that are subjective and highly variable; in fact, two patients can have no overlapping symptoms and be diagnosed with the same disease. While cardiologists have blood tests to help diagnose heart attacks and oncologists have PET scans to find hidden cancers, […]
The overall aim of the REACT Study is to create and assess smartphone-based cognitive tasks to examine how acute alcohol intoxication affects attention. First, we will adapt laboratory-based cognitive tasks for use on smartphones. To maximize usability, feedback will be gathered in rapid prototyping interviews with young adults. Then, we will evaluate the adapted smartphone […]
The purpose of this study is to compare two implementation strategies for a social engagement intervention that supports autistic children and their non-autistic peers during recess. Remaking Recess has been shown to improve peer engagement for autistic students when implemented by paraeducators during recess. However, without supports, paraeducators face barriers to implementing the intervention well. […]
The proposed research will determine whether primary care clinics should offer medications or talk therapy first to treat posttraumatic stress. In addition, for patients who do not respond to the first treatment, the STEPS trial will determine what treatment should be offered next. More information on our info sheet.
Improved financial literacy among people living with serious mental illness (SMI) is associated with a higher quality of life, fewer hospitalizations, and better treatment adherence. Yet people living with SMI frequently express how their lack of financial knowledge has negative personal consequences and that they don’t know where to turn for assistance. This project will […]
We developed VetASSiST (Veterans Activating Social Support for Self-management and Treatment engagement) to help patients with multimorbidity overcome barriers to self-management and improve HRQoL. This trial has several aims: 1) Test the effect of VetASSiST, compared to usual care, on the primary outcome of baseline to one-year change in physical HRQoL, and secondary outcomes of […]
This study will examine the efficacy of the Helping Educational Leaders Mobilize Evidence (HELM) implementation strategy for promoting building-level implementation leadership, implementation climate, and high-fidelity delivery of evidence-based practices. This study tests whether HELM improves outcomes when used in conjunction with Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS), an evidence-based practice. The researchers will compare the […]
Healthcare workers and first responders working during the COVID-19 pandemic have experienced increased exposure to suffering and loss; prolonged work hours; and increased personal risk. Although associated increases in psychiatric symptoms and occupational burnout are well documented, what aspects of the experiences are most strongly associated with negative outcomes over time – and what interventions […]
This is a study of an app intended to support recent sexual assault survivors, called THRIVE. In a prior grant, we pilot tested THRIVE and found that it reduced risk for alcohol misuse and posttraumatic stress. In the first year of this grant, we aim to revise the app to increase usability and inclusivity. In […]
In the TIGER research study, we are learning more about individuals with genetic events associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), intellectual disability (ID), and/or developmental delay (DD) in order to better describe how different gene disruptions impact behavior in children and adults.
TNS uses a device to send currents into the brain and stimulate the trigeminal nerve. This method has proven effective to treat depression and other psychiatric disorders. The research team is working to understand if this approach could help improve executive function and reduce symptoms of ADHD. Previous studies have shown that this is effective […]
This project will identify interaction patterns with online video platforms that are indicative of suicide risk, focusing on YouTube and TikTok. Leveraging archival data including over 5 million interaction events collected from participants in previous research, we will use combinations of neural language models to identify suicide-related “like”, “search” and “watch” events. We will then […]
This QI project aims to expand from general medical wards to inpatient psychiatry the use of predictive risk-modeling for violence or restraint, using Natural Language Processing of clinical notes. We will also assess whether NLP paired with generative AI can accurately summarize a wider range of clinical notes relevant to behavioral emergencies
This project aims to improve the treatment of depression in cancer patients. Up to 25% of people with cancer will become clinically depressed, significantly affecting their quality of life, functioning, and ability to tolerate cancer treatment. Unfortunately, about 75% of cancer patients with depression do not receive adequate treatment, and patients in rural settings are […]
Approximately 20-25% of primary care patients have unhealthy alcohol use, which can have significant impacts on mental health. Screening for unhealthy alcohol use within primary care settings is increasingly used for point-in-time identification of people who could benefit from brief advice or brief interventions. My project will use a large, longitudinal, real-world dataset consisting of […]
The goal of this study is to understand the impact of stigma on mental health and recovery from trauma in different parts of the country.
