Safer Use of Antipsychotics in Youth

SUAY is a practical clinical trial designed to test the effectiveness of an intervention aiming to improve the targeted and safer use of antipsychotic medications by guiding clinician-prescribing behavior of antipsychotics for children aged ≥ 3 and < 18 years and encouraging psychosocial therapy for eligible youth. The intervention includes a medication best practice alert in Epic, consultation with a child and adolescent psychiatrist, and extra support for patients and families to improve behavioral health service access. The trial will be conducted in 4 non-academic health systems. Each health system will randomize prescribers to one of two study arms, intervention and control. During patient encounters, entering an antipsychotic for a potentially eligible patient will cause either the control or intervention medication alert to fire in the electronic medical record. The control arm medication alert will point prescribing clinicians to relevant Choosing Wisely® recommendations. The intervention arm medication alert will inform prescribers that:

• Antipsychotics are not recommended 1st line treatment for non-psychotic disorders;
• A child and adolescent psychiatrist (CAP) will review antipsychotic usage by youth;
• Expedited access to bridging therapy, behavior health navigation, and/or a proactive consultation with a CAP may be ordered.

The intervention medication alert will point prescribing clinicians to both Choosing Wisely® recommendations and to SUAY clinical prescribing guidelines. SUAY guidelines were developed by a national expert consensus panel in a prior phase of the study.

Analytic data will be collected from automated data sources at the health systems. The primary outcomes are percent of children ordered an antipsychotic medication at 6 months of follow up, and total person-months of antipsychotic orders placed for participants during the study period.

Inclusion criteria

• Patient is ≥ 3 and < 18 years of age at the time of the encounter at which the study alert fired (index date);
• Patient is initiating a new episode of outpatient treatment with an antipsychotic medication. (New episodes are defined by no record of an antipsychotic medication being ordered within the health system as part of an outpatient care plan in the prior 180 days);
• Study service (BH navigation, bridging therapy, CAP consult) ordered in Epic for the patient; (e.g., provider removed antipsychotic order and still ordered study services);

Exclusion criteria

• Patient has a diagnosed psychotic disorder, mania, autism spectrum disorder, or intellectual disability;
• Patient was enrolled in the SUAY pilot study;
• The antipsychotic entered is prochlorperazine (Comazol®);
• An outpatient antipsychotic order is entered by a temporary provider in the health system (e.g., "doc of the day"). Orders placed by temporary providers do not count towards the 180 day medication free period for defining a new episode of care.
• The antipsychotic order was placed within an urgent care, emergency department, or inpatient setting (to avoid intervening during a crisis). Orders placed in these settings do not count towards the 180 day medication free period for defining a new episode of care.
• Primary language is not English