The UW Medicine Garvey Institute for Brain Health Solutions is awarding over $1 million to develop and test innovative approaches to caring for adolescents and young adults with mental health and addiction problems. The Innovation Grants will go to 12 UW faculty-led teams representing 7 UW schools and colleges, 12 departments and divisions and numerous UW- and community-based centers, institutes and organizations.
The focus on adolescent and young adult mental health was driven by the steadily increasing rates of depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts in adolescents and young adults over the past decade. These troubling trends have only worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Funded topics range from addressing suicide risk in primary care settings to providing pediatric telebehavioral health consultation to community hospital emergency departments.
The funded innovations:
- Reducing barriers to accessing mental health care using a web-based program for young adults
Project lead: Jennifer Cadigan, PhD (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, UW School of Medicine) - Monitoring mood symptoms in young adults at-risk for bipolar disorder
Project lead: Joseph Cerimele, MD, MPH (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine) - Addressing suicide risk in primary care to reduce youth suicide
Project leads: Denise Chang, MD and Sarah Danzo, PhD (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine) - Using teen Mental Health First Aid to address mental health inequity among school youth
Project lead: Chieh (Sunny) Cheng, RN, PhD (Nursing and Healthcare Leadership, School of Nursing, Tacoma) - Adapting a resilience intervention for youth athletes
Project lead: Sara Chrisman, MD, MPH (Department of Pediatrics, Adolescent Medicine, School of Medicine) - Decreasing engagement and transmission of suicide-related content on TikTok
Project lead: Katherine Anne (Kate) Comtois, PhD (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine) - Optimizing mental health first-aid programming for sport coaches
Project lead: Emily Kroshus, ScD, MPH (Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine; Health Systems and Population Health, School of Public Health) - Improving mental health in adolescents and young adults with long COVID through exercise
Project leads: Sara Chrisman, MD, MPH (Department of Pediatrics, Adolescent Medicine, School of Medicine); Payal Patel, MD (Department of Neurology, School of Medicine) - Expanding access to adolescent depression care by non-specialists with a digital intervention
Project lead: Laura Richardson, MD, MPH (Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine; Health Systems and Population Health, School of Public Health; Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine) - Developing a pediatric telebehavioral health consultation model for emergency departments
Project lead: Brooke Rosen, MD (Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine) - Identifying and treating loneliness in young adults in primary care
Project lead: Sebastian Tong, MD, MPH (Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine) - Developing a cannabis intervention for young adults with psychosis
Project lead: Denise Walker, PhD (Innovative Programs Research Group, School of Social Work)
Read more on the Garvey Institute for Brain Health Solutions website, plus find a a full list of projects, collaborators and descriptions.
The Institute was founded in in 2019 with a $50 million donation to UW Medicine by local philanthropists Lynn and Mike Garvey with a goal to fast-track treatments for patients with mental health, addiction and other brain health problems.
