The NIHR Mental Health Translational Research Collaboration (MH-TRC) secured over £42m of funding to establish the Mental Health Mission (MHM) in 2023.
The MHM, in collaboration with the ASCEnD trial into bipolar disorder, has set up a national network of NHS mood disorder experts to meet regularly to discuss anonymised patient cases of those experiencing complex and difficult to treat depression (DTD).
The experts, from diverse clinical and academic backgrounds, discuss complexities of individual cases and share experiences of treating patients who have presented similar conditions.
Specialist services in mood disorders are rare. This collaboration between healthcare providers from different clinical-academic centres across the UK provides an opportunity to learn from each other’s expertise, share the latest research and refine treatment approaches with the aim of achieving positive outcomes for patients.
Dr Tiago Costa, Senior Research Fellow in Psychiatry at the Newcastle University Northern Centre for Mood Disorders and member of the professional network said:
“Overall, feedback from attendees of the network has been positive. One attendee noted that as a relatively new consultant, having access to information that cannot usually be found in textbooks, based on the experiences of patients, clinicians and academics was very helpful.”
Professor Hamish McAllister-Williams, Professor of Affective Disorders at Newcastle University and MHM Mood Disorders workstream co-lead said:
“The funding provided by the NIHR has been instrumental in facilitating these outcomes, without this financial support, organisers would struggle to find the time and energy to run this network. Participation and access to this level of expertise is vital for the ongoing success of the network.”
For more information about the ASCEnD trial or network of mood disorder experts please email: Ascend@newcastle.ac.uk.
