On Wednesday, April 19, 2023, Dr. Jami F. Young, Associate Chair of Research in the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and faculty member in CHOP’s PolicyLab offered a free webinar, “Early Identification and Prevention of Youth Depression” presented by the Alan Hu Foundation.

4:49 Overview
5:30 Depression: Public Health Issue
12:48 Depression is Preventable
14:35 IPT-AST
20:33 Components of IPT-AST
23:07 Pre-Group Session(s)
25:46 Abbreviated Interpersonal Inventory
29:12 Initial Phase (Sessions 1-3)
33:56 IPT-AST Communication Strategies
38:22 Middle Phase (Sessions 4-6)
42:20 Mid-Group Session
43:00 Termination Phase (Sessions 7-8)
45:50 IPT-AST in Schools (Indicated Prevention)
48:12 IPT-AST in Schools (Universal Prevention)
52:13 Expanding the Reach for Prevention
58:08 Q&A

Dr. Young discussed work she has conducted over the past 20 years that has focused on the identification and prevention of adolescent depression using Interpersonal Psychotherapy-Adolescent Skills Training (IPT-AST). The webinar explained the need for depression prevention, provided an overview of IPT-AST, briefly summarize the data from several IPT-AST studies, and shared lessons learned from developing IPT-AST and conducting prevention work in community settings, including schools.

Dr. Young is a clinical psychologist and a Professor of Psychiatry at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She has received funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). Dr. Young’s work aims to decrease the incidence of adolescent depression and increase children’s access to evidence-based assessment, prevention, and treatment of depression and other behavioral health conditions.

Mental Health Association for Chinese Communities (MHACC) https://www.mhacc-usa.org collaborated with Alan Hu Foundation to provide instant Chinese interpretation.

We were honored and privileged that Dr. Young shared the knowledge and experiences of IPT-AST. We were grateful to our audience for tuning in across United States as well as from Australia, Belize, Brazil, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Spain, and United Kingdom. Thank you, MHACC Founder and President Elaine Peng. Thank you, Ida Shaw, for simultaneous Chinese Interpretation.