Psychosis Patients Find New Hope

A classroom-style treatment teaches patients to live with the voices

- JULIE WERNAU

Noah Hudnut's family had already spent $150,000 on his psychiatric care when he was hauled in handcuffs by police to the emergency room of UCLA medical center.

On top of the family's past expenses, Hudnut's insurance company was billed at least $1,000 a day for his hospitalizations. Yet, his psychosis persisted. He believed he grew to gigantic proportions and knocked down the Twin Towers on 9/11, even though he had been 6 years old. He also was certain he caused the Covid-19 pandemic.

After Hudnut started driving erratically and throwing away valuables in a delusional state, his family called the police in November 2022, and he was taken to UCLA. While in the hospital, Hudnut said, "I came to the conclusion that either I was insane or everyone around me was."

Following Hudnut's release from the hospital, his family enrolled him at California OnTrack, a treatment program offered by Pand Health. His 14 months of treatment cost a fraction of what the family and health insurers had paid for his care over the previous six years. So far, it has worked.

Hudnut, 28 years old, has a job with a company that helps people negotiate overdue taxes with the Internal Revenue Service. His own condition, schizoaffective disorder with bipolar condition, feels like a cancer in remission, he said.

"I don't feel like I'm out of the woods," Hudnut said. "But I feel like if I do everything in my power to prevent it from happening again, I have a good chance."

California OnTrack uses a skills-based therapy program called coordinated specialty care, which is offered through at least 381 programs in all 50 states. The program substantially reduces symptoms of psychosis, as well as hospitalizations and homelessness compared with traditional treatment, according to published studies.