Here’s How Care Teams Can Help People With Schizophrenia

CSC teams usually include medical support, case management, employment and educational support, and family education and support. It’s important that each patient is included as much as possible in treatment planning as they work together with their support team to make decisions regarding treatment and care, per NIMH.

Here’s who you should consider for your or your loved one’s care team and how they can help individuals with schizophrenia manage their symptoms and live well.

1. Psychiatrist

Medical care is typically guided by a psychiatrist — a medical doctor specializing in mental health — who may coordinate treatment with other mental health professionals such as a psychologist, social worker, case manager, or psychiatric nurse, according to Mayo Clinic.

Medication management is a cornerstone of schizophrenia treatment, and finding the right option and dosage is one of the primary goals of psychiatric care for this condition, per Mayo Clinic. Psychiatrists can prescribe and manage medication among people with schizophrenia.

Talk therapy is another key component of care, which may be provided by a psychiatrist or by another mental health professional who coordinates closely with the psychiatrist to help ensure that any medications provided get the desired outcomes.

2. Primary Care Provider

An individual’s primary care provider who they see for the majority of their health needs can play a key role in a schizophrenia treatment team.

People with schizophrenia are at higher risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and obesity, due in part to antipsychotics and other medications that can cause weight gain, according to prior research. That’s one reason having regular follow-up with a primary care doctor is essential.

Some primary care doctors include the use of nutritional counseling, which can help reduce the impact of chronic diseases like these, according to prior research.

3. Social Worker

Social workers are professionals that may help clients with disabilities, life-threatening diseases, or with social issues like inadequate housing or unemployment, for instance, according to the National Association of Social Workers (NASW). They may also help families with serious domestic conflicts such as abuse.

Social workers can play a key role in helping people with schizophrenia set and accomplish goals for treatment and for living and participating in their communities, according to the NASW.

They can help people with schizophrenia and their families develop a treatment plan and learn more about different interventions that may be helpful alongside medication, such as individual and family therapy, vocational rehabilitation, or educational assistance, per the NASW. Social workers can also facilitate individual and family therapy sessions, NASW states.

4. Psychologist

Psychologists are mental health professionals that can evaluate and treat mental health conditions like schizophrenia through individual or family psychotherapy, as well as conduct psychological testing and evaluations, according to Cleveland Clinic.

Certain psychologists, known as clinical psychologists, tend to focus on treating serious mental health conditions (like schizophrenia), per Cleveland Clinic. However, although they can facilitate psychotherapy, they usually cannot prescribe medication or order blood or imaging tests.

5. Case Manager

Many people living with severe psychiatric conditions like schizophrenia need assistance coordinating treatment and handling a variety of tasks in their day-to-day lives, according to the Center for Excellence in Community Mental Health at the University of North Carolina (UNC). Case managers can help people with schizophrenia set goals to work toward and then identify strategies and tools to help achieve these things, per UNC.

Case managers can also be a resource for families of people with schizophrenia, helping to identify the most beneficial ways that they can be involved in supporting the patient and steering family caregivers to support systems they may need to manage their own self-care, according to UNC.

Case managers can guide family caregivers to community resources and other tools to support a variety of tasks that might be hard for some people with schizophrenia to manage independently such as scheduling appointments, managing finances, or finding and keeping a job.

6. Family Caregivers

Family support and caregiving is an essential part of the support team, Duckworth says. It can be helpful for people with schizophrenia to tell family members and friends about the condition in order to receive their encouragement and for assistance with specific needs, such as transportation to doctor or therapist appointments, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).

Family therapy is an important way for families to learn how they can best support their loved one (more on the benefits of family therapy below). The right kind of family support has been shown to make a significant difference for patients. People in families with high levels of criticism, hostility, and overinvolvement have more frequent symptom recurrence, according to research.