(provided by candidate): The objective of this five-year Young Investigator Award is to develop my skills as a researcher with specialization in mental illness, physical comorbidity, disability, and treatment outcome, an area with few clinical researchers. My goal is to develop interventions that enhance older mentally ill patients' ability to manage physical co-morbidities (such as diabetes mellitus). Mounting evidence suggests that onset diabetes is a physical co-morbidity is related to schizophrenia and its treatment. Patients with schizophrenia, with cognitive and social deficits are at risk for poor management of this disease which may hasten the onset of complications leading to great personal suffering and financial cost to society. This award will build on my training in clinical psychology and on my background in clinical research, treatment outcome and gerontology.
The aim of the award is to develop as an independent researcher at the University of California San Diego by furthering my skills in the following areas: 1) rehabilitation methods, 2) chronic medical illness, 3) geriatric psychiatry, 4) and research methodology. These skills will be acquired by coursework, consultation with experts in diabetes, serious mental illness, and treatment outcome, and by designing and executing a pilot test of an enhanced intervention to improve diabetes knowledge and management in this population.
