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Background: Although public-academic partnerships (PAPs) to improve the health and well-being of vulnerable populations have proliferated in public care for youth, existing literature lacks information about whether PAPs lead to public care agency leaders' use of research evidence and promote youth mental health and well-being. Aims and objectives: The document analysis was conducted to understand PAP contexts and mechanisms leading to public care agency leaders' use of research evidence. This paper introduces US public mental health and child welfare systems, shares strategies of identifying PAPs, obtaining and conducting systematic document review of PAPs, and documents analysis findings. Methods: This project conducted document analysis of US PAPs aiming to improve mental health and promote well-being of youth aged 12-25 years. Findings: The 23 PAPs analysed had diverse partnership goals including implementation and dissemination of research/evaluation evidence, information sharing, and prioritising and streamlining research priorities. PAPs sustained longer than 10 years had more focused goals of programme and policy evaluations and professional training, while PAPs 10 years or newer were engaged in more diverse goals. The majority of PAPs used journal articles, presentations, and multimedia as dissemination strategies of findings. Fewer than half of the PAPs reported on use of PAP-generated evidence in subsequent decision making by public care agency leaders. Discussion and conclusions: Further research should examine which mechanisms link partnership contexts, PAP leaders' research evidence use, and youth outcomes improvement. Future research should also examine PAPs by detailed stages of development and ask PAP leaders directly about their evidence use.

Background: Attribution models have been examined in Western countries. However, little is known about the applicability of the attitude–emotion–behavior model within Chinese culture. This study aimed to examine the association between familiarity, perceived dangerousness, fear, and social distance towards persons with mental illness (PMI) in the Chinese context. Methods: An online cross-sectional survey was conducted from October to November 2022 in mainland China. A total of 1493 college students completed a questionnaire evaluating familiarity, perception of dangerousness, fear, and social distance regarding PMI. Path analysis was employed to validate the model proposed in this study. Results: Participants expressed moderate to high levels of stigma towards PMI. Familiarity was negatively associated with social distance (p < 0.01). Participants who perceived PMI as dangerous were more prone to exhibit a reaction of fear (p < 0.001), consequently leading to social distance (p < 0.01). However, the mediating effect of perceived dangerousness and fear on the relationship between familiarity and social distance was not significant (p > 0.05). Conclusions: The results of this study provide support for Corrigan's attributional model of stigma in the Chinese context. Contact-based interventions for stigma reduction should emphasize multiple elements of contact, including the quality of contact, rather than familiarity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: It is unclear whether the enhancing contact model (ECM) intervention is effective in reducing family caregiving burden and improving hope and quality of life (QOL) among family caregivers of persons with schizophrenia (FCPWS). Methods: We conducted a cluster randomized controlled trial in FCPWS in eight rural townships in Xinjin, Chengdu, China. In total, 253 FCPWS were randomly allocated to the ECM, psychoeducational family intervention (PFI), or treatment as usual (TAU) group. FCPWS in three groups were assessed caregiving burden, QOL and state of hope at baseline (T0), post-intervention (T1), 3-month (T2), and 9-month (T3) follow-up, respectively. Results: Compared with participants in the TAU group, participants in the ECM group had statistically significantly lower caregiving burden scores both at T1 and T2 (p = 0.0059 and 0.0257, respectively). Compared with participants in the TAU group, participants in the PFI group had statistically significantly higher QOL scores in T1 (p = 0.0406), while participants in the ECM group had statistically significantly higher QOL scores in T3 (p = 0.0240). Participants in both ECM and PFI groups had statistically significantly higher hope scores than those in the TAU group at T1 (p = 0.0160 and 0.0486, respectively). Conclusions: This is the first study to explore the effectiveness of ECM on reducing family caregiving burden and improving hope and QOL in rural China. The results indicate the ECM intervention, a comprehensive and multifaceted intervention, is more effective than the PFI in various aspects of mental wellbeing among FCPWS. Future research needs to confirm ECM's effectiveness in various population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and aims: The increasing prevalence of mental illness and low treatment rate presents a pressing public health issue in China. Pervasive stigma is a significant barrier to mental health recovery and community inclusion. In particular, stigmatizing or supportive attitudes held by healthcare providers could either perpetuate or mitigate self-stigma of people with mental illness. Moreover, mental health resources are unevenly distributed in China, with most of them concentrated in urban centers and provincial capitals. This study explores healthcare providers' attitudes toward mental illness and the challenges they faced at work in a rural Chinese county. Method: Four focus groups were conducted with 36 healthcare providers from a three-tier mental healthcare system in a rural county in southwestern China. Focus group discussions were recorded and transcribed verbatim. The team employed a conventional content analysis approach for data analysis. All transcripts were double-coded by three bilingual team members who are native Chinese speakers. Coding discrepancies were resolved by consensus. Results: Healthcare providers recruited from the county, township, and village levels varied in educational background, professional qualification, and experience of working with people with mental illness. Five thematic categories identified across four groups include (1) barriers to mental healthcare delivery, (2) keys to mental health recovery, (3) providers' attitudes toward providing care, (4) providers' perception toward patients and family members, and (5) providers' perception of training needs. Conclusions: This is a unique study that included healthcare providers from a three-tier healthcare system. Findings signal the importance of understanding healthcare practitioners' experiences and views to inform the design of training initiatives in rural or low-resource communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Although knowledge is a crucial component in contact theory delineating how prejudice changes toward out-groups with stigmatized conditions, little is known about the mediating role of knowledge on contact, stigmatizing attitudes, and behaviors toward mental illness. Aim: This study aimed to examine the mechanism underlie contact and stigma change by knowledge. Methods: A total of 366 participants including family members (FM), mental health providers (MHP), and community residents (CR) recruited across communities in Hong Kong and completed measures of contact level, contact quantity, contact quality, mental health related knowledge, prejudice, and discriminatory behaviors. Structural equation modeling was adopted to test the association among the key variables. Results: Higher level of contact was significantly correlated with better knowledge, less prejudice, and less discriminatory behaviors. Knowledge was directly and negatively correlated with prejudicial attitudes but was not significantly related to discriminatory behaviors. Furthermore, lower levels of prejudice were associated with less discriminatory behaviors. Conclusion: Enhancement of contact may increase understanding toward people with mental illness (PMI) and diminish stigmatizing attitudes and behaviors. Although prejudicial attitudes may be reduced by broadening mental health knowledge, increasing knowledge only might not ameliorate discriminatory behaviors. Future research should test mediators on contact and stigma by using longitudinal data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Self-stigma exerts a range of adversities for persons with severe mental illness (SMI), however, little is known about the association between peer contact, social support and self-stigma. Aims: This study aimed to explore the mediating role of social support on the relationship between peer contact and self-stigma among persons with SMI in Hong Kong. Methods: A total of 159 persons with SMI (schizophrenia and mood disorder) in community service centres participated in the study through completing a survey on self-stigma, social functioning, social support, perception of peer contact and mass media. Logistic regression was utilised to explore the influencing factors of self-stigma among the participants. Results: The results showed that 81.1% of participants reported moderate to severe levels of self-stigma. Self-stigma was significantly associated with diverse factors (e.g. social functioning). Importantly, positive peer contact was significantly associated with lower self-stigma of persons with SMI. Social support acted as a mediator between peer contact and self-stigma. Conclusion: The results of this study suggest that contact-based interventions, such as enhancing positive peer-to-peer contact, should be conducted for reducing self-stigma among persons with SMI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Our study aimed to examine psychiatric diagnoses and treatment preceding a schizophrenia diagnosis in adolescents, stratified by sex and race/ethnicity. Methods: Using Medicaid physical and behavioral health and pharmacy claims data, we identified 1,459 adolescents who were aged 9–17 years and diagnosed with schizophrenia between January 2006 through June 2009. Psychiatric diagnosis, mental health service use including psychiatric hospitalization, residential treatment and outpatient therapy and psychotropic medication use preceding schizophrenia were identified. Results: Forty-five percent of the adolescents were diagnosed with one or more psychiatric conditions. More than 40% of the adolescents were hospitalized or placed in a residential treatment facility for other psychiatric conditions preceding schizophrenia. Overall, 72% of the adolescents were prescribed with one or more psychotropic medications and 22% were prescribed with three or more psychotropic medications in the year prior to their first schizophrenia diagnosis. We found that sex and race/ethnicity influence preceding psychiatric conditions and psychiatric treatment use. Conclusions: Careful screening and evaluation to validate diagnoses is important as the presence of certain psychiatric morbidity is common among adolescents with schizophrenia during the prodromal period. Developing acceptable and accessible interventions that will reduce psychiatric hospitalization and residential treatment care and improve care connection for schizophrenia treatment is important to mitigate complexity in treatment for adolescents and reduce cost burden for families and the society. Integrating health claims data in the development of schizophrenia risk conversion models can be useful in effectively predicting ideal timing of tailored interventions for adolescents with preceding psychiatric conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Community integration is an important component of recovery for persons with serious mental illnesses (SMI). However, persons with SMI often experience barriers in using community resources, participating in community activities, and developing interactions with neighbors and other community members. Aims: This study examines the association between different sources of social support, including family, friends and mental health services providers, and three dimensions of community integration. Method: A sample of 399 persons with SMI was interviewed from community-based mental health service agencies in South Korea. Results: Family support and friendship support positively influenced all three aspects of community integration. More support from mental health professionals was associated with increased perceived accessibility to community resources but decreased involvement in community activities. Conclusion: Recommendations are made in supporting the role of natural networks and in advocating for a consumer-centered approach to service delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]