Efficacy of the team solutions program for educating patients about illness management and treatment

Abstract

Objective: Despite the demonstrated efficacy of psychosocial approaches to schizophrenia treatment that include a psychoeducational component, such as illness management, the implementation of these approaches into routine mental health treatment has been slow. The authors sought to examine the efficacy of a comprehensive, modularized, psychoeducational program called Team Solutions, which was designed to educate patients with major mental illnesses about their illness and how to manage it. Team Solutions was chosen for study because it is available over the Internet and other venues at no cost and is used by mental health agencies across the United States and Canada.

Methods: Seventy-one persons with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder from three day treatment settings participated in this randomized, single-blind study. Participants were randomly assigned to attend one of two interventions: the Team Solutions intervention, which consisted of participating in a 24-week psychoeducational group focused on illness management, or treatment as usual.

Results: For participants who attended the experimental group, significant improvement was observed in knowledge about schizophrenia. In addition, client satisfaction was high. However, no changes were observed in symptoms or functioning.

Conclusions: Results indicated that participation in the Team Solutions psychoeducational group improved participants' knowledge. However, participation in the program did not demonstrate superiority over treatment as usual with respect to secondary and tertiary outcomes, such as symptom severity, treatment adherence, and global functioning.