AEPCC is the Australian Early Psychosis Collaborative Consortium (we call it AEPCC, pronounced ‘APEX’) – a groundbreaking project all about improving the lives of young people experiencing psychosis.
Our goals are to:
Strengthen early psychosis services
Improve the quality of early psychosis research
Connect people from across the early psychosis sector
We can only achieve these goals by partnering with researchers, clinicians, mental health advocates, policy makers and, most importantly, with the lived experience community, who are at the heart of our work.
AEPCC is working to have three programs up and running by December 2024:
- a Lived Experience Network;
- a Clinical Trials and Translation Network; and
- a Clinical Quality Registry.
The lived experience community
The early psychosis lived experience community is central to AEPCC’s work.
This community includes the thousands of young Australians who experience psychosis every year, as well as carers, family members and countless other loved ones who walk alongside them in their recovery journey.
As psychosis can affect anyone, the early psychosis community is a truly diverse group – with an even more diverse set of needs.
AEPCC aims to not only identify these needs, but also to enact meaningful change to ensure they are met.
AEPCC Lived Experience Network (LEN)
We want people with lived experience to be integral to AEPCC’s leadership and decision-making. Most importantly, we want to achieve this in a way that’s authentic and impactful.
So, we’re setting up a Lived Experience Network (LEN) with members from across Australia.
This network will connect early and emerging psychosis service users from all walks of life, offering a shared space for people with lived experience to connect, reflect collectively and influence AEPCC’s work.
This national network will collaborate with the other two AEPCC programs to:
- shape policy;
- identify areas of improvement in early psychosis research and treatment;
- advocate for marginalised voices; and
- explore ways of raising awareness and combatting stigma.
AEPCC Clinical Trials and Translation Network (CTTN)
A clinical trials network is a collective of researchers working collaboratively to identify important research questions, carry out high-quality research and, ultimately, use this research to improve care.
At AEPCC, we’re applying these principles to the early psychosis sector and creating a Clinical Trials and Translation Network (CTTN) of our own. We’ve added an extra element – translation – to make sure research findings are translated into real-world practice.
Research into early psychosis is essential – it offers us valuable insight into the condition, helps us understand the causes of psychosis and helps us identify which treatments are most effective.
The better the quality of research, the better we can tailor treatment to the needs of the individual and, in doing so, improve people’s lives.
The AEPCC CTTN will be set up to endorse large-scale, high-quality research, and support the translation of results into clinical practice.
AEPCC Clinical Quality Registry (CQR)
Clinical quality registries are databases set up to collect health-related information from a group of people. These people might be diagnosed with a specific condition, or they could be accessing a specific service or type of treatment.
Clinical quality registries are powerful tools to improve care and are used across healthcare.
At AEPCC, we’re setting up a Clinical Quality Registry (CQR) for early psychosis, which will be the first of its kind in Australia.
Analysing the data collected will give us greater insight into treatment, care, and symptoms related to early psychosis, and will hopefully lead to improved outcomes for the lived experience community.