New Beginnings: Reimagining Psychosis Services & Systems in the US

ISPS-US 23rd Annual Conference | November 1-3, 2024 | University of Pittsburgh & Duquesne University | Pittsburgh, PA & Hybrid Online | Preliminary Schedule

9:45am EDT

Dismantling Power Hierarchies and Rethinking Priorities: The Transformative Potential of Lived Experience Led 'Psychosis' Research (Hybrid)

Saturday November 2, 2024 9:45am - 11:15am EDT

Union Ballroom

Over the past decades, participatory methods and lived experience/service user involvement have gained substantial traction in mental health research and policy. While the United States arguably lags well behind countries such as the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, there has nevertheless been a marked uptick in interest and investment in involvement. Unfortunately, as a nominal emphasis on involvement grows, so too have tokenism and cooptation, mirroring longer-term trends in peer support. This panel brings together three international leaders in the lived experience research space – Andrew Grundy (University of Manchester & University College London), Nev Jones (University of Pittsburgh) and Alison Branitsky (University of Manchester)—two of whom are based in the UK, in a panel that will reflect on the deeper, transformative value of lived experience leadership, the harms of cooptation, and the possibilities of work that truly reflects the values, methods and priorities of those historically marginalized in psychosis-relevant knowledge production.

Speakers

Andrew Grundy, PhD

University College London

Dr Andrew Grundy is a Senior Lived Experience Research Fellow, and Deputy Director and Lived Experience Researcher Lead at the Policy Research Unit for Mental Health, University College London, UK. He is also a Lived Experience Researcher in the School of Health Sciences, University... Read More →

Alison Branitsky, Mres

University of Manchester/Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust

Alison Branitsky is a lived-experience researcher and mental health advocate whose work focuses on broadening our understanding of and approaches to responding to extreme mental distress. She currently is a PhD student at the University of Manchester in the UK.

Nev Jones, PhD

University of Pittsburgh

Nev Jones, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the School of Social Work and affiliate faculty in psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh. Grounded in direct experience of psychosis, her scholarship and clinical training work have sought to challenge conventional over-simplifications... Read More →

Saturday November 2, 2024 9:45am - 11:15am EDT
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

11:30am EDT

Meaningful Street Therapy: Beyond Crisis, Quantification, and Quick-fix (Hybrid)

Saturday November 2, 2024 11:30am - 12:30pm EDT

Union Ballroom

In this panel, we will be sharing, discussing, and thematizing preliminary results from an ongoing, grant-funded, qualitative research study which looks at how those experiencing homelessness and housing precarity interact with, negotiate, and navigate mental health services in the City of Pittsburgh.

From this foundational research, we will tentatively imagine how humanistic, phenomenological, and psychoanalytic perspectives could challenge and transform what is widely accepted as mental health services for those experiencing homelessness in the City of Pittsburgh.

Speakers

Jeremy Northup, PsyD, MA

Point Park University

Jeremy J. Northup is a researcher and Assistant Professor of Psychology at Point Park University. He has worked in many settings across the psy-disciplines including college counseling, community mental health, and state psychiatric facilities. He is co-founder of the Pittsburgh Continental... Read More →

Calla Kainaroi, MA, LSW

Executive Director, Bridge Outreach

Calla Kainaroi is the Executive Director of Bridge Outreach. She has a Master's Degree in Clinical-Community Psychology and is a Licensed Social Worker.

Anna Kreienberg, MA

Duquesne University

Anna Kreienberg is a Clinical Psychology doctoral student at Duquesne University. She practices psychotherapy in community mental health settings and teaches on the psychology of gender.

Saturday November 2, 2024 11:30am - 12:30pm EDT
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

1:30pm EDT

Phenomenology panel: Psychosis at the Intersection of Subject and System (Hybrid)

Saturday November 2, 2024 1:30pm - 3:00pm EDT

Union Ballroom

Phenomenological psychopathology has traditionally applied the methods and concepts of phenomenology to clarify the experience of those with psychiatric diagnoses, including psychosis. While this has prioritized the lived experience of persons with psychosis and broadened the scope of what psychiatry and other mental health disciplines pay attention to in diagnostic and treatment practices, the focus of phenomenological psychopathology, with some exceptions, primarily been limited to an emphasis on alterations in isolated individuals.

However, there have been some recent trends to expand the discipline to a consideration of systems of care and how they may impact or be involved in the experience of psychosis. Along these lines, one line of work has explored using the tools of phenomenology to explore the meaning-making process in the psychiatric encounter, recognizing the ways certain narratives and explanations may be privileged while others ignored or pathologized. Another set of literature has used phenomenological research methods to explicate encounters with various systems of care and opportunities for enhancing shared decision-making among those with psychosis. A third has pushed for user-led research to further broaden the range of experiences considered in phenomenological approaches to psychosis, while also interrogating the impact of stigma on accessing care. Others have focused on the ways that psychosis is embedded in and takes up particular cultural and political landscapes, and on the impact of contextual factors in experiences of and responses to various interventions.

In this panel, we will hear from several panelists on the ways they view the potential for phenomenology to consider experiences of and within healthcare systems, and on the challenges phenomenological psychopathology still faces in its current conceptualizations of psychosis. Commentary and discussion will follow, with an emphasis on linking these initiatives with the history of phenomenological psychopathology and on the relevance of this work for conferences attendees.

Speakers

Elizabeth Pienkos, PsyD

Duquesne University

Dr. Liz Pienkos is a licensed clinical psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychology at Duquesne University. Her research focuses on the phenomenology of schizophrenia, using qualitative methods to explore the mechanisms and features of this and other psychiatric disorders. Her... Read More →

Anthony Pavlo, PhD

Yale University

Anthony J. Pavlo, PhD is clinical psychologist and an Associate Research Scientist at the Yale University Program for Recovery and Community Health, Department of Psychiatry. Dr. Pavlo’s work is dedicated to ensuring all patients can experience and benefit from high quality person-centered... Read More →

Cherise Rosen, MD, PhD

University of Illinois-Chicago

Cherise Rosen, PhD is faculty at the University of Illinois, Department of Psychiatry. Dr. Rosen is a phenomenologist who has conducted extensive research on dimensions of psychosis. She is Co-PI of the Chicago Longitudinal Research Program which is one of the longest running follow-up... Read More →

Matthew Broome, PhD

University of Birmingham

Professor Matthew Broome BSc (Hons) MBChB (Hons) PGCAP PhD PhD FRCPsych (he/him)Matthew Broome is Chair in Psychiatry and Youth Mental Health, and Director of the Institute for Mental Health atthe University of Birmingham. In the NHS, Matthew is Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist to... Read More →

Shannon Pagdon, BA

University of Pittsburgh

Shannon Pagdon, BA (she/they), is a joint masters/doctoral student at the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Forensic Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and is a former Research Coordinator for EPINET New York State Psychiatric... Read More →

Nadika Paranamana, PsyD

Yale University

Nadika Paranamana, Psy.D., is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University School of Medicine and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Connecticut Healthcare System. Dr. Paranamana’s work is grounded in humanistic-existential framework and is centered on justice, diversity, equity... Read More →

Saturday November 2, 2024 1:30pm - 3:00pm EDT
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

3:30pm EDT

Involuntary Commitment and its Potential Impacts: A Multidisciplinary Dialogue Spanning Research, Ethics and Methodology (Hybrid)

Saturday November 2, 2024 3:30pm - 5:00pm EDT

Union Ballroom

The involuntary hospitalization of people experiencing mental health crises is a widespread practice across the US, as common as imprisonment in state and federal prisons. In spite of persistent concerns from service users and advocates, the impacts of involuntary treatment have been difficult to characterize, and causal inference limited by structural and ethical barriers. This panel will lead with important new research led by Dr. Welle utilizing administrative data from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, and leveraging the quasi-random assignment of evaluating physicians in order to estimate causal effects of involuntary hospitalization on post-discharge death by suicide or overdose, violent crime and employment. For individuals whom some physicians would hospitalize but others would not, the team has found that hospitalization nearly doubles the probability of being charged with a violent crime or dying by suicide or overdose in the three months after evaluation. Remaining panelists – Drs. Morgan Shields, Awais Aftab, and Travis Donohoe – will reflect on these provocative findings and share their own adjacent work. Specifically, Dr. Shields will focus on inpatient psychiatry, including common experiences in inpatient settings, and the potential role of inpatient iatrogenic harm with respect to post-discharge outcomes. Dr. Awais, a community psychiatrist and philosopher of psychiatry, will discuss ethical and political implications, as well as potential ways forward. Finally, Dr. Donahoe will reflect on methods-related challenges and next steps to advance policy research across the US.

Moderators

Nev Jones, PhD

University of Pittsburgh

Speakers

Pim Welle, PhD

Chief Data Scientist, Allegheny County Department of Health, Carnegie Mellon University

Morgan Shields, PhD

Washington University

Morgan Shields’ researches the quality and accountability of behavioral healthcare. Her work seeks to identify implementation strategies to improve the use of evidence-based practices, with a focus on patient-centered care and equity. She is particularly focused on identifying policies... Read More →

Awais Aftab, MD

Case Western Reserve University

Travis Donahoe, PhD

University of Pittsburgh

I am a health economist whose research focuses on how public policies can reduce harms from addictive substance use at the population level. My work on this topic features applied economic theory, state-of-the-art econometric methods, and large and novel datasets.

Saturday November 2, 2024 3:30pm - 5:00pm EDT
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

5:30pm EDT

Structural Influences on Mental Health Crisis (Care) in the US: Barriers and Pathways to Transformation (Hybrid)

Saturday November 2, 2024 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT

Union Ballroom

Decades after deinstitutionalization, mental health crisis care in the U.S. remains fraught with systemic challenges. Inadequate funding, fragmented services, and policy shortcomings contribute to persistent disparities. Crisis services are critically inadequate and increasingly carceral despite intentions to shift to community-based, person-centered approaches. People experiencing psychosis are more likely to face discrimination and harm within this carceral system. Additionally, underfunded social welfare services and rising living costs make meeting basic needs difficult. Consequently, crisis responses to unmet needs are often pathologized, leading to poverty, unemployment, criminalization, incarceration, housing precarity, and coercive interventions. These issues are exacerbated for historically marginalized populations facing additional discrimination.

Compounding these challenges is the increasing cooptation of peer-based services into the medical system. While peer support can offer holistic and effective care that normalizes experiences of psychosis, its integration into a medical model risks undermining its foundational principles of mutuality and lived experience. This shift can negate the efficacy of peer-based approaches, making it harder to address the root causes of mental health crises compassionately and person-centered.

Despite these systemic barriers, pockets of hope and innovation exist. Community-driven grassroots initiatives and novel research and advocacy efforts are beginning to reshape mental health crisis care. This highlights the potential for transformative change by challenging cultural narratives around psychosis and promoting inclusive approaches to wellbeing.

This roundtable will:
1. Explore how structural influences scaffold our mental health crisis care system and perpetuate adverse mental and social outcomes.
2. Foster substantive conversations about the current state of mental health crisis care.
3. Encourage collaborative efforts to address systemic barriers.

The stigmatization and criminalization of mental health crises often result in punitive rather than compassionate responses. Amplifying diverse lived experiences into leadership roles can help address a critical need to expand non-carceral interventions that prioritize recovery and dignity over punishment.

Speakers

Sarah F Porter, MHS, MSW

University of Washington School of Social Work

Sarah F Porter (she/her/u), MHS, is an MSW/PhD student at the University of Washington School of Social Work. Her research in critical suicidology seeks to improve crisis mental health services by addressing societal and systemic factors that influence suicidality. Sarah’s dissertation... Read More →

Jeffrey Ciak, MSW

Virginia Commonwealth University

Jeff Ciak is a second-year doctoral student at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Social Work. Jeff has worked with adults with psychiatric disabilities and substance use disorders in a variety of settings. These professional experiences inform his research interests... Read More →

Jess Stohlmann-Rainey

Much Madness LLC

Jess Stohlmann-Rainey (she/her) loves to talk about suicide, peer support, and liberation. She is a mad care worker located in so-called Denver (unceded ancestral lands of the Arapaho, Cheyenne, Núu-agha-tʉvʉ-pʉ̱ (Ute), and Očhéthi Šakówiŋ (Sioux) people). She is currently... Read More →

Nze Okoronta

Executive Director, Solstice House Peer Respite and Warmline

Nze is a harm reductionist, facilitator, and consultant. They are known for work surrounding crisis services, public health impact and social policy. They provide consultation around crisis alternatives, peer run respites, peer run warmlines, peer support supervision & harm reduction... Read More →

Tim Saubers

National Association of Peer Supporters

Saturday November 2, 2024 5:30pm - 6:30pm EDT
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

9:45am EST

A Retrospective of the Icarus Project: Lessons for Contemporary Mental Health Movements (Hybrid)

Sunday November 3, 2024 9:45am - 11:15am EST

Union Ballroom

From 2002-2020, The Icarus Project developed a network of peer support groups and a creative media outlet that provided a home for folks who experienced mental health struggles and a deep alienation from society. Drawing inspiration from anarchism, anti-psychiatry, permaculture, and other counterculture movements, we aimed to normalize discussions of altered states, intense emotional distress, and suicidality and foster solidarity among people with experiences that were often diagnosed as “serious mental illness” and “psychosis.” At its height, The Icarus Project had thousands of online forum community members, dozens of local peer support/mutual aid groups, and a series of DIY publications that made their way into public mental health systems and became texts for academic analysis. At the same time, we also struggled greatly with interpersonal conflict, leadership burnout and turnover, issues related to identity politics and structural oppression, technological system management, and other challenges common to small social movement organizations.

More than 20 years since its founding, The Icarus Project has left a complicated legacy of ideas and creative visions, influencing individuals and organizations across North America and the world. Former members have gone on to play significant roles in transformative mental health practices, advocating for approaches that prioritize human connection, social justice, and the de-stigmatization of mental health experiences. Others left the organization with the sense that their efforts were underappreciated and lacked recognition in public narratives.

This panel will delve into the origins and impact of The Icarus Project, exploring how its creative grassroots approach has influenced contemporary mental health movements. Attendees will learn about the project's innovative use of language, its critique of the mainstream medical model of “mental illness,” and its commitment to fostering mutual aid communities. Panelists, including co-founders and long-time collaborators, will reflect on the project's successes and challenges, offering insights into how its legacy can inform future efforts in mental health social movements.

Speakers

Erica Hua Fletcher

Greater Los Angeles VA Healthcare System

Dr. Fletcher is a mental health services researcher at the VA of Greater Los Angeles. Her research focuses on peer-involved interventions, mental health social movements, and Mad/disability studies. She has worked on adapting the Hearing Voices support group approach for Veterans... Read More →

Sascha DuBrul, MSW

Institute for the Development of Human Arts

Sascha Altman DuBrul, MSW is the co-founder of The Icarus Project, a network of peer based mental health support groups and media project dedicated to redefining the language and culture of mental health and illness. He has a Masters from Silberman School of Social Work and worked... Read More →

Jacks McNamara

Jacks McNamara is a trauma healing coach, facilitator, educator, writer and artist based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Jacks has been in private practice for 11 years, with a specialty in using somatics and Internal Family Systems to support queer and trans survivors, and in mentoring... Read More →

Sunday November 3, 2024 9:45am - 11:15am EST
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

11:30am EST

Re-imagining the ‘Risk Assessment and Management’ of Psychosis in Mental Health Services from Lived Experience Perspectives (Hybrid)

Sunday November 3, 2024 11:30am - 12:30pm EST

Union Ballroom

Whilst international guidance suggests that service users should be involved in safety planning, service users report that they are unaware of, uninvolved in, and ill-equipped for risk assessment and management across all mental health service settings.

What dynamics are at play which explain why ‘mad and risky’ individuals (often labeled as having psychosis/schizophrenia) are not truly heard in professional risk assessment practice in mental health services?
This presentation will begin by briefly describing a critical ethnography that was conducted on one acute psychiatric inpatient unit in the UK. Key findings were that, whilst individuals were wanting to share their ‘experiential knowledge’ of their inner world, they were uninvolved in risk-discussions largely because processes of gathering ‘clinical knowledge’ (e.g., observations and documentation) of risk were hidden from them.

Two ethnographic case studies will illuminate dynamics as to how experiential knowledge is downplayed, dismissed, and marginalised (epistemic injustice) in risk assessment and management of psychosis – via the dismissal of unique fears/threats (as ‘mere delusions’) and via other ‘unacceptable’ expressions of testimony. Other examples will be given from my own lived experience of being risk assessed, which shed further light on these dynamics.

To truly reimagine psychosis services and systems, these knowledge/power/attitudinal dynamics must be transparently addressed. I will argue that clinicians need: to critically examine the naïve positivistic assumptions underpinning their own knowledge regime in assessing risk; to realise the biases, subjectivities, and emotional value-judgements embedded in their own risk practice; to understand that the Mad can only truly be heard when their testimony and meaning-making are understood as knowledge; and to unpack what co-production means, to ascertain what is actually achievable in the context of producing collaborative safety plans within these current dynamics.

Speakers

Andrew Grundy, PhD

University College London

Sunday November 3, 2024 11:30am - 12:30pm EST
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

1:30pm EST

Meaningful Lived Experience Involvement across Mental Health Systems (Hybrid)

Sunday November 3, 2024 1:30pm - 3:00pm EST

Union Ballroom

The integration of lived experience within mental health systems has gained recognition as a crucial element in enhancing service delivery and outcomes. This panel will explore the multifaceted dimensions of meaningful involvement of individuals with lived experience (peers) in mental health systems, emphasizing the co-production of services, training, and research. Drawing from qualitative research and panel members' expertise we will examine best practices and barriers to effective involvement. Central to our analysis is the concept of "meaningful involvement," which transcends tokenistic inclusion, advocating for active and sustained participation that influences decision-making processes.

We investigate various models of engagement, including peer support roles, advisory boards, and co-researcher positions, highlighting successful implementations across different mental health settings. We seek to discuss how meaningful involvement contributes to a more empathetic and person-centered approach in mental health services, fostering trust and improving all elements of services. Key factors for success include robust training programs for peers, institutional commitment to culture change, and the creation of supportive infrastructures that value lived experience as essential expertise. However, myriad challenges persist, such as stigma, power imbalances, and the sustainability of peer roles within traditional hierarchies. We provide recommendations to address these challenges thorough different lenses, with a panel with four lived experience experts and one clinical expert. The panel seeks to underscore the necessity of embracing lived experience as a cornerstone in the evolution of mental health systems.

By systematically incorporating the voices of those who have navigated mental health challenges, we can co-create more responsive, effective, and humane systems of care. The perspectives gleaned from this panel aim to inform practitioners, policymakers, researchers, and individuals with lived experience in committed to fostering inclusive and transformative mental health services.

Speakers

Shannon Pagdon, BA

University of Pittsburgh

Katherine Sanford, BA

University of California, Davis

Katie Sanford (she/her) is an individual living with schizoaffective disorder. She is the lead of the Lived Experience Integration Team on the EPI-CAL California Early Psychosis Network project based out of UC Davis. Katie also has over 10 years of mental health advocacy experience... Read More →

Brandon Daniels

Brandon Daniels is a non binary, Afro-Caribbean American 28 year old who holds the position of a psychiatric survivor, justice impacted individual, peer support specialist, organizer and educator. He is a graduate of Howie the Harp Advocacy Center, a certified peer specialist, and... Read More →

Sunday November 3, 2024 1:30pm - 3:00pm EST
Union Ballroom

Breakout Session, Hybrid

New Beginnings: Reimagining Psychosis Services & Systems in the US

From $41.75