Center for Addiction Medicine

Integrated Behavioral Diabetes Management for Individuals with Serious Mental Illness

The goal of this project was to improve health outcomes for people with serious mental illness (SMI) and diabetes, a highly prevalent comorbidity that results in high levels of healthcare utilization and poor medical outcomes, including significant premature mortality. We developed a 16-week tailored behavioral and educational group intervention for individuals with schizophrenia and diabetes, utilizing the concept of ‘reverse integrated care,’ bringing medical intervention into the community mental health setting. Core features of this intervention included motivational interviewing, basic education, and problem solving.