What is TYPPEX?

The NIHR TYPPEX programme focuses on a hitherto unidentified group of patients receiving NHS talking therapies for depression and anxiety. Theoretically predicted and endorsed by our lived-experience advisory panel, researchers discovered that almost a third of patients are experiencing psychotic phenomena (such as hallucinations and inexplicable suspiciousness) that marks more severe depression and anxiety, and predicts poor outcomes in services that, nationally, treat more than a million people a year. With strong input from people with lived experience (coordinated by the McPin Foundation), the programme then tailored a new blend of existing psychological therapies to address this presentation that previously hid in plain sight, and are in the final stages of a multi-centre, stepped-wedge RCT. This is a disruptive, trans-diagnostic programme that may not only have important therapeutic impacts, but will lead to a reappraisal of psychotic experiences in clinical settings where they were once assumed to be harbingers of other mental disorders such as schizophrenia. The trial is due to report in January 2025.