The impact of scaffolded and non-scaffolded suicidal virtual human interaction training on clinician emotional self-awareness, empathic communication, and clinical efficacy.

BACKGROUND: Clinicians working with patients at risk of suicide often experience high stress, which can result in negative emotional responses (NERs). Such negative emotional responses may lead to less empathic communication (EC) and unintentional rejection of the patient, potentially damaging the therapeutic alliance and adversely impacting suicidal outcomes. Therefore, clinicians need training to effectively manage negative emotions toward suicidal patients to improve suicidal outcomes. METHODS: This study investigated the impact of virtual human interaction (VHI) training on clinicians' self-awareness of their negative emotional responses, assessed by the Therapist Response Questionnaire Suicide Form, clinicians' verbal empathic communication assessed by the Empathic Communication and Coding System, and clinical efficacy (CE). Clinical efficacy was assessed by the likelihood of subsequent appointments, perceived helpfulness, and overall interaction satisfaction as rated by individuals with lived experience of suicide attempts. Two conditions of virtual human interactions were used: one with instructions on verbal empathic communication and reminders to report negative emotional responses during the interaction (scaffolded); and the other with no such instructions or reminders (non-scaffolded). Both conditions provided pre-interaction instructions and post-interaction feedback aimed at improving clinicians' empathic communication and management of negative emotions. Sixty-two clinicians participated in three virtual human interaction sessions under one of the two conditions. Linear mixed models were utilized to evaluate the impact on clinicians' negative emotional responses, verbal empathic communication, and clinical efficacy; and to determine changes in these outcomes over time, as moderated by the training conditions. RESULTS: Clinician participants' negative emotional responses decreased after two training sessions with virtual human interactions in both conditions. Participants in the scaffolded condition exhibited enhanced empathic communication after one training session, while two sessions were required for participants in the non-scaffolded condition. Surprisingly, after two training sessions, clinical efficacy was improved in the non-scaffolded group, while no similar improvements were observed in the scaffolded group. CONCLUSION: Lower clinical efficacy after virtual human interaction training in clinicians with higher verbal empathic communication suggests that nonverbal expressions of empathy are critical when interacting with suicidal patients. Future work should explore virtual human interaction training in both nonverbal and verbal empathic communication.

Using Virtual Patients to Assess and Improve Clinicians' Emotional Self-awareness: a Randomized Controlled Study.

OBJECTIVE: Working with suicidal patients can elicit negative emotional responses that can impede clinicians' empathy and affect clinical outcomes. Virtual human interactions represent a promising tool to train clinicians. The present study investigated the impact of virtual human interaction training to enhance clinicians' emotional self-awareness and empathy when working with suicidal patients. METHODS: Clinicians were randomly assigned into two groups. Both groups interviewed a virtual patient presenting with a suicidal crisis; clinicians in the intervention condition (n = 31) received immediate feedback about negative emotional responses and empathic communication, whereas those in the control condition (n = 33) did not receive any feedback. All clinicians interviewed a second virtual patient 1 week later. Clinicians' emotional response to the two virtual patients and their empathic communication with each of them were assessed immediately after each interaction. Linear mixed models were used to assess change in clinicians' emotional response and verbal empathy between the two interactions across conditions. RESULTS: Clinicians' emotional responses toward the suicidal virtual patients were unchanged in both conditions. Clinicians in the intervention condition presenting low empathy level with the first virtual patient showed higher empathy level with the second virtual patient than with the first (B = 1.15, SE = 0.25, p < 0.001, 95% CI [0.42, 1.89]). CONCLUSIONS: This work demonstrates the feasibility of using virtual human interactions to improve empathic communication skills in clinicians with poor empathy skills. Further refinement of this methodology is needed to create effective training modules for a broader array of clinicians.

Antipsychotic Polypharmacy.

Physicians who treat patients with schizophrenia frequently encounter complex clinical situations not fully addressed by published treatment guidelines. Some of these situations lead to antipsychotic polypharmacy, often prescribed when clinical and social obstacles prevent access to clozapine and patients have had suboptimal responses to nonclozapine monotherapy. We offer our perspective on the place of antipsychotic polypharmacy in the current treatment guidelines for patients with schizophrenia. We summarize data on the prevalence of antipsychotic polypharmacy and describe common clinical situations in which this practice is encountered, along with the pharmacological underpinnings of this practice. We briefly review evidence on common risks of antipsychotic polypharmacy and describe the limited evidence for the possible benefits of such practice. Moreover, we take a look at alternative antipsychotic augmentation strategies that address all domains of psychosis.

The role of sequestosome 1/p62 protein in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia pathogenesis.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal lobar degeneration are multifaceted diseases with genotypic, pathological and clinical overlap. One such overlap is the presence of SQSTM1/p62 mutations. While traditionally mutations manifesting in the ubiquitin-associated domain of p62 were associated with Paget's disease of bone, mutations affecting all functional domains of p62 have now been identified in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal lobar degeneration patients. p62 is a multifunctional protein that facilitates protein degradation through autophagy and the ubiquitin-proteasome system, and also regulates cell survival via the Nrf2 antioxidant response pathway, the nuclear factor-kappa B signaling pathway and apoptosis. Dysfunction in these signaling and protein degradation pathways have been observed in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal lobar degeneration, and mutations that affect the role of p62 in these pathways may contribute to disease pathogenesis. In this review we discuss the role of p62 in these pathways, the effects of p62 mutations and the effect of mutations in the p62 modulator TANK-binding kinase 1, in relation to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-frontotemporal lobar degeneration pathogenesis.

Addressing the Poverty Barrier in Collaborative Care for Adults Experiencing Homelessness: A Case-Based Report.

The Collaborative Care (CC) model of integrated care is an evidence-based, systematic approach in which primary care and behavioral health teams work together to deliver effective treatment for depression and other common mental illnesses in primary care settings. Because people experiencing homelessness have high rates of chronic medical conditions, mental illness and substance use disorders, interventions that integrate the physical, mental and social determinants of health have been shown to be effective to provide healthcare for this population in primary care outpatient settings. In this article we describe the implementation of a collaborative care program to treat depression in a population of adults experiencing homelessness and receiving primary care in a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) located in Downtown Miami, Florida. We present three case studies that highlight key concepts, potential benefits and limitations in using this model to treat patients experiencing depression and homelessness in urban areas.

Associations between clinicians' emotional responses, therapeutic alliance, and patient suicidal ideation.

BACKGROUND: Mental health clinicians frequently experience intense negative emotional responses to suicidal patients, which have been related to treatment outcome. This study examines the therapeutic alliance as a mediator of the relationship between clinicians' negative emotional responses at the initial encounter and patients' suicidal ideation (SI) concurrently and 1 month later. METHODS: We assessed 378 adult psychiatric outpatients (62.7% female; mean age = 39.1 ± 14.6 years) and their 61 treating clinicians. Following the initial encounter, self-report questionnaires assessed clinicians' emotional responses to their patients, patients' and clinicians' perception of the therapeutic alliance, and patients' SI. The SI was reassessed 1 month after the initial visit. Multilevel mediation analyses were performed. RESULTS: Patients' (but not clinicians') perception of the therapeutic alliance mediated the relationship between clinicians' negative emotional responses to patients and patients' SI 1 month following the initial visit (indirect effect estimate = 0.015; p < .001). CONCLUSIONS: The association between clinicians' negative emotional response and patients' prospective SI appears to be transmitted, at least partly, through the patients' perception of the poorer early quality of the therapeutic alliance. Thus, clinicians' awareness and management of their emotional states appear essential both for the identification of suicidal risk and to enhance therapeutic alliance and treatment outcomes.

Correction to: Role of empathy in the perception of medical errors in patient encounters: a preliminary study.

In the original publication of this article [1], an author name was misspelled.

Role of empathy in the perception of medical errors in patient encounters: a preliminary study.

OBJECTIVE: Healthcare professionals' empathy have been empirically demonstrated to decrease the risk of medical errors. Medical errors affect patient's outcomes and healthcare providers' well-being. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between patients' perception of healthcare providers' empathy, their intention to adhere to treatment, and their perception of medical errors made. An anonymous survey was emailed to staff at a health center and an urban university in Miami, Florida, USA. RESULTS: A total of 181 participants were enrolled. Participants rating their healthcare provider as high in empathy had 80% lower odds of reporting errors (CI 0.04-0.6). The intention to follow-up with recommendations or return to the provider were not significantly associated with provider's empathy. Patients of high empathy providers were no more treatment adherent that those who rated their provider with low empathy but were less likely to perceive medical error. Providers' empathy significantly affected patients' perception of medical errors. Our results underscore that healthcare curricula need to address the link between empathy and perception of medical errors, including its potential legal implications.

Emotional Responses to Suicidal Patients: Factor Structure, Construct, and Predictive Validity of the Therapist Response Questionnaire-Suicide Form.

BACKGROUND: Mental health professionals have a pivotal role in suicide prevention. However, they also often have intense emotional responses, or countertransference, during encounters with suicidal patients. Previous studies of the Therapist Response Questionnaire-Suicide Form (TRQ-SF), a brief novel measure aimed at probing a distinct set of suicide-related emotional responses to patients found it to be predictive of near-term suicidal behavior among high suicide-risk inpatients. The purpose of this study was to validate the TRQ-SF in a general outpatient clinic setting. METHODS: Adult psychiatric outpatients (N = 346) and their treating mental health professionals (N = 48) completed self-report assessments following their first clinic meeting. Clinician measures included the TRQ-SF, general emotional states and traits, therapeutic alliance, and assessment of patient suicide risk. Patient suicidal outcomes and symptom severity were assessed at intake and one-month follow-up. Following confirmatory factor analysis of the TRQ-SF, factor scores were examined for relationships with clinician and patient measures and suicidal outcomes. RESULTS: Factor analysis of the TRQ-SF confirmed three dimensions: (1) affiliation, (2) distress, and (3) hope. The three factors also loaded onto a single general factor of negative emotional response toward the patient that demonstrated good internal reliability. The TRQ-SF scores were associated with measures of clinician state anger and anxiety and therapeutic alliance, independently of clinician personality traits after controlling for the state- and patient-specific measures. The total score and three subscales were associated in both concurrent and predictive ways with patient suicidal outcomes, depression severity, and clinicians' judgment of patient suicide risk, but not with global symptom severity, thus indicating specifically suicide-related responses. CONCLUSION: The TRQ-SF is a brief and reliable measure with a 3-factor structure. It demonstrates construct validity for assessing distinct suicide-related countertransference to psychiatric outpatients. Mental health professionals' emotional responses to their patients are concurrently indicative and prospectively predictive of suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Thus, the TRQ-SF is a useful tool for the study of countertransference in the treatment of suicidal patients and may help clinicians make diagnostic and therapeutic use of their own responses to improve assessment and intervention for individual suicidal patients.

Combination Antipsychotic Therapies: An Analysis From a Longitudinal Pragmatic Trial.

BACKGROUND: Combination antipsychotics (CAs) are prescribed in schizophrenia despite limited evidence of efficacy. To explore the effect of switching from CA to monotherapy, we performed an exploratory analysis of the PROACTIVE (Preventing Relapse in Schizophrenia: Oral Antipsychotics Compared with Injectables: Evaluating Efficacy) study data, in which 305 patients with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder were followed for 30 months after randomization to long-acting injectable (LAI) risperidone or second-generation oral antipsychotic (OA). METHODS: Patients who entered the PROACTIVE study on CA (n = 50), LAI (n = 20), or OA (n = 206) were compared in terms of time to relapse and clinical measures. FINDINGS: The OA group had significantly fewer hospitalizations than the CA group (P = 0.009) at baseline. In the CA group, 68% patients relapsed versus 53% in the LAI, and 52% in the OA groups. Although there was no significant difference in the relapse rate among groups on χ test (χ = 3.85, P = 0.146), the log-rank test showed a significant difference among the groups in time to first relapse (χ = 6.81, P = 0.033), with significantly longer time to relapse in the OA group (mean, 562.8 days) than in the CA group (mean, 409.5; P = 0.011). The LAI group's mean time to first relapse (594 days) was not significantly different from the other groups. However, after adjusting for number of hospitalizations, group was no longer significant (hazard ratio, 1.541; P = 0.052). IMPLICATIONS: Based on our exploratory analysis, taking antipsychotic combinations predicts earlier relapse and calls for additional treatment guidance in schizophrenia.

A Psychiatric-Specific Entrustable Professional Activity for the Evaluation of Prospective Psychiatric Residents: Towards a National Standard.

INTRODUCTION: Entrustable professional activities (EPAs) were developed as a way to ensure adequate skills of the medical school graduate. While the 12 EPAs apply to all medical specialties, EPA 1, "Gather a history and perform a physical examination," applies most explicitly to psychiatry through the performance of a mental status exam. Although proficiency in performing a psychiatric interview and mental status exam evolves throughout a psychiatrist's professional life, basic proficiency is essential in order to function as a psychiatry intern. We developed a tool for assessing the mental status exams conducted by future psychiatry residents. METHODS: Our tool contains both a video of a psychiatrist interviewing a patient and a mental status exam rating sheet that can be used when students present a mental status exam orally or in writing. We incorporated feedback from psychiatry educators at an annual meeting of the Association for Medical Student Educators in Psychiatry, followed by the reiteration of the video and the rubric. Subsequently, the rubric was verified on the performance of a cohort of 13 third- and fourth-year medical students from three institutions. RESULTS: In their mental status exam presentations, students covered all the items measured by the rubric. There was a significant difference between the third- and fourth-year medical students in describing the cognitive exam. DISCUSSION: Overall, our tool offers an opportunity to standardize mental status presentations by senior medical students who wish to specialize in psychiatry.

Using Virtual Patients to Teach Empathy: A Randomized Controlled Study to Enhance Medical Students' Empathic Communication.

INTRODUCTION: Physician empathy is a complex phenomenon known to improve illness outcomes; however, few tools are available for deliberate practice of empathy. We used a virtual patient (VP) to teach empathic communication to first-year medical students. We then evaluated students' verbal empathy in a standardized patient (SP) interaction. METHODS: Seventy medical students, randomly assigned to 3 separate study groups, interacted with (1) a control VP portraying depression, (2) a VP with a backstory simulating patient shadowing, or (3) a VP able to give immediate feedback about empathic communication (empathy-feedback VP). Subsequently, the students interviewed an SP portraying a scenario that included opportunities to express empathy. All SP interviews were recorded and transcribed. The study outcomes were (1) the students' verbal response to the empathic opportunities presented by the SP, as coded by reliable assessors using the Empathic Communication Coding System, and (2) the students' responses as coded by the SPs, using a communication checklist. RESULTS: There were no significant differences in student demographics between groups. The students who interacted with the empathy-feedback VP showed higher empathy in the SP interview than did the students in the backstory VP and the control VP groups [mean (SD) empathy scores coded on a 0-6 scale were 2.91 (0.16) vs. 2.20 (0.22) and 2.27 (0.21), respectively). The difference in scores was significant only for the empathy-feedback VP versus the backstory VP group (P = 0.027). The SPs rated the empathy-feedback and the backstory VP groups significantly higher than the control VP group on offering empathic statements (P < 0.0001), appearing warm and caring (P = 0.015), and forming rapport (P = 0.004). CONCLUSIONS: Feedback on empathy in a VP interaction increased students' empathy in encounters with SPs, as rated by trained assessors, whereas a simulation of patient shadowing did not. Both VP interventions increased students' empathy as rated by SPs, compared with the control VP group.

The Use of Simulation to Teach Suicide Risk Assessment to Health Profession Trainees-Rationale, Methodology, and a Proof of Concept Demonstration with a Virtual Patient.

OBJECTIVE: There is increasing use of educational technologies in medical and surgical specialties. Described herein is the development and application of an interactive virtual patient (VP) to teach suicide risk assessment to health profession trainees. We studied the effect of the following: (1) an interaction with a bipolar VP who attempts suicide or (2) completion of a video-teaching module on interviewing a bipolar patient, on medical students' proficiency in assessing suicide risk in standardized patients. We hypothesized that students who interact with a bipolar VP will be at least as likely to assess suicide risk, as their peers who completed a video module. METHODS: In a randomized, controlled study, we compared the frequency with which second-year students at the Medical College of Georgia asked suicide risk and bipolar symptoms questions by VP/video group. RESULTS: We recruited 67 students. The VP group inquired more frequently than the video group in 4 of 5 suicide risk areas and 11 of 14 other bipolar symptomatology areas. There were minimal to small effect sizes in favor of the VP technology. The students preferred the video over the VP as an educational tool (p = 0.007). CONCLUSIONS: Our study provides proof of concept that both VP and video module approaches are feasible for teaching students to assess suicide risk, and we present evidence about the role of active learning to improve communication skills. Depending on the learning context, interviewing a VP or observation of a videotaped interview can enhance the students' suicide risk assessment proficiency in an interview with a standardized patient. An interactive VP is a plausible modality to deliver basic concepts of suicide risk assessment to medical students, can facilitate individual preferences by providing easy access and portability, and has potential generalizability to other aspects of psychiatric training.

Homelessness in schizophrenia.

The impact of mental illness, comorbid substance abuse, and medication nonadherence, coupled with disjointed psychiatric and social services, conspires to a disproportionately high rate of psychiatric disorders among people who are homeless in the United States. This article reviews the prevalence of homeless among the mentally ill as well as the prevalence of mental illness among the homeless and details barriers in access to care and the solutions that have been attempted. The need and solutions to introduce a new generation of physicians and allied health care workers to the unique health care needs of the homeless population are highlighted.