Treating psychosis: Is there more to early intervention than intervening early?

While the possibility of early intervention following the initial onset of psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia is an exciting development, a clo ser examination of the nature and content, as well as the timing, of treatm ent is required for this new approach to be successful. Modification and in tegration of diverse treatments need to be empirically investigated for the ir potentially greater effectiveness inpatients who are, in general, much y ounger, naive to the mental health system, and possibly capable of full int egration into society. Reducing delay in treatment initiation may be comple x, may involve adopting early identification strategies, and may pose signi ficant systemic and conceptual challenges. The 2 aspects of early intervent ion-integration of phase specific treatments and early case identification- need to go hand in hand to ensure that another opportunity will not be miss ed in our efforts to improve the outcomes of these most serious of all ment al disorders.