Effective primary care for individuals with serious mental illness: an intervention and systematic review

Individuals diagnosed with serious mental illness have higher rates of comorbid physical illness than people without serious mental illness. This dissertation, provided in the Multiple Article Path format, explores how comorbidities in this population have historically been addressed and examines effectiveness of interventions to address comorbidity in primary care. This research also describes the development and implementation of a specific primary care-based program to address comorbidities and patient perspectives on that program. Theoretical frameworks of this dissertation include social constructionism, labeling theory and critical theory. The first article in this project is a qualitative study exploring patient perspectives on care. The second article describes the primary care-based implementation of a care program. The third article is a systematic review of primary care-based behavioral and educational interventions to address comorbidity.