A five-year prospective evaluation of a new community psychosis service in North London: introducing the Recovery and Enablement Track (RET)

ABSTRACT

Background

United Kingdom mental healthcare guidelines recommend recovery-focused services for people with psychosis. We evaluated a “Recovery and Enablement Track” (RET) aiming to promote recovery and well-being, reduce distress and maintain independence from secondary care following discharge, for people with established psychosis and long histories of secondary care.

Method

From March 2015 to December 2019, 214 individuals entered the RET and were followed up 12 months’ post-discharge. Recovery, well-being, and distress were measured at assessment, review, and discharge. Of 214 total people, 86 consented to inclusion for this evaluation.

Results

Well-being and recovery significantly improved from assessment to discharge – distress did not. Distress improved from review to discharge, suggesting improvement during service contact. 79% (68/86) of individuals were discharged to the care of their family doctor, and 22% of these (15/68) re-presented before 12-month follow-up.

Conclusion

Recovery and well-being improved from assessment to discharge, distress improved from review to discharge. Half of consenting participants were successfully discharged from secondary care following the RET, suggesting potential to promote recovery. Comparison to a formal control condition with systematic analysis of any biasing effect of missing data (i.e. through refusal to participate) is now indicated.

KEYWORDS:

• Recovery
• community service evaluation
• psychosis

Acknowledgments

The authors are sincerely grateful to staff and clients who participated in planning, implementing, using, evaluating, and developing the Recovery and Enablement Track.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.