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Physical exercise augmented cognitive behaviour therapy for older adults with generalised anxiety disorder (PEXACOG): study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND:Generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) is a frequent and severe anxiety disorder among older adults. GAD increases the risk of developing other disorders such as depression and coronary heart disease. Older adults with GAD exhibit a poorer response to cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) compared to younger patients with GAD. The normal age-related cognitive decline can be a contributor to reduced treatment efficacy. One strategy for improving treatment efficacy is to combine CBT with adjunctive interventions targeted at improving cognitive functions. Physical exercise is a viable intervention in this regard. Increased levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor may mediate improvement in cognitive function. The present study aims to investigate the proposed effects and mechanisms related to concomitant physical exercise. METHODS:The sample comprises 70 participants aged 60-75?years, who have GAD. Exclusion criteria comprise substance abuse and unstable medication; inability to participate in physical exercise; and conditions which precludes GAD as primary diagnosis. The interventions are individual treatment in the outpatient clinic at the local psychiatric hospital, with two experimental arms: (1) CBT?+?physical exercise and (2) CBT?+?telephone calls. The primary outcome measure is symptom reduction on the Penn State Worry Questionnaire. Other measures include questionnaires, clinical interviews, physiological, biological and neuropsychological tests. A subset of 40 participants will undergo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). After inclusion, participants undergo baseline testing, and are subsequently randomized to a treatment condition. Participants attend five sessions of the add-on treatment in the pre-treatment phase, and move on to interim testing. After interim testing, participants attend 10 sessions of CBT in parallel with continued add-on treatment. Participants are tested post-intervention within 2 weeks of completing treatment, with follow-up testing 6 and 12?months later. DISCUSSION:This study aims to develop better treatment for GAD in older adults. Enhancing treatment response will be valuable from both individual and societal perspectives, especially taking the aging of the general population into account. TRIAL REGISTRATION:ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02690441 . Registered on 24 February 2016.

SUBMITTER: Stavestrand SH

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6423789 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Physical exercise augmented cognitive behaviour therapy for older adults with generalised anxiety disorder (PEXACOG): study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

Stavestrand Silje Haukenes SH Sirevåg Kristine K Nordhus Inger Hilde IH Sjøbø Trond T Endal Trygve Bruun TB Nordahl Hans M HM Specht Karsten K Hammar Åsa Å Halmøy Anne A Martinsen Egil W EW Andersson Eva E Hjelmervik Helene H Mohlman Jan J Thayer Julian F JF Hovland Anders A

Trials 20190318 1

<h4>Background</h4>Generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) is a frequent and severe anxiety disorder among older adults. GAD increases the risk of developing other disorders such as depression and coronary heart disease. Older adults with GAD exhibit a poorer response to cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) compared to younger patients with GAD. The normal age-related cognitive decline can be a contributor to reduced treatment efficacy. One strategy for improving treatment efficacy is to combine CBT wit ...[more]

PMID: 30885256

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Project description:BackgroundGeneralised anxiety disorder (GAD) is a chronic and disabling condition with considerable personal and economic impact. Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is a recommended psychological therapy for GAD; however, there are substantial barriers to accessing treatment. Digital CBT, in particular smartphone-delivered CBT, has the potential to improve accessibility and increase dissemination of CBT. Despite the emerging evidence of smartphone-based psychological interventions for reducing anxiety, effect size scores are typically smaller than in-person interventions, and there is a lack of research assessing the efficacy of smartphone-delivered digital interventions specifically for GAD.MethodsIn the DeLTA trial (DigitaL Therapy for Anxiety), we plan to conduct a parallel-group superiority randomised controlled trial examining the efficacy of a novel smartphone-based digital CBT intervention for GAD compared to a waitlist control. We aim to recruit 242 adults (aged 18 years or above) with moderate-to-severe symptoms of GAD. This trial will be conducted entirely online and will involve assessments at baseline (week 0; immediately preceding randomisation), mid-intervention (week 3), post-intervention (week 6; primary end point) and follow-up (week 10). The primary objective is to evaluate the efficacy of the intervention on GAD symptom severity compared to a waitlist control at post-intervention. Secondary objectives are to examine between-group effects on GAD at follow-up, and to examine the following secondary outcomes at both post-intervention and follow-up: 1) worry; 2) depressive symptoms; 3) wellbeing; 4) quality of life; and 5) sleep difficulty.DiscussionThis trial will report findings on the initial efficacy of a novel digital CBT intervention for GAD. Results have the potential to contribute towards the evidence base for digital CBT for GAD and increase the dissemination of CBT.Trial registrationISRCTN, ISRCTN12765810. Registered on 11 January 2019.

Project description:BackgroundGeneralised anxiety disorder (GAD) is a chronic and pervasive condition that generates high levels of psychological stress, and it is difficult to treat in the long term. Current pharmacotherapeutic options for GAD are in some cases only modestly effective, and may elicit undesirable side effects. Through targeted actions on the gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) pathway, the South Pacific medicinal plant kava (Piper methysticum) is a non-addictive, non-hypnotic anxiolytic with the potential to treat GAD. The evidence for the efficacy of kava for treating anxiety has been affirmed through clinical trials and meta-analyses. Recent research has also served to lessen safety concerns regarding the use of kava due to hepatotoxic risk, which is reflected in a recent German court overturning the previous kava ban in that country (which may in turn influence a reinstatement by the European Union). The aim of current research is to assess the efficacy of an 'aqueous noble cultivar rootstock extract' of kava in GAD in a larger longer term study. In addition, we plan to investigate the pharmacogenomic influence of GABA transporters on response, effects of kava on gene expression, and for the first time, the neurobiological correlates of treatment response via functional and metabolic imaging.Methods/designThis clinical trial is funded by the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (APP1063383) and co-funded by MediHerb (Integria Healthcare (Australia) Pty. Ltd). The study is a phase III, multi-site, two-arm, 18-week, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled study using an aqueous extract of noble kava cultivar (standardised to 240 mg of kavalactones per day) versus matching placebo in 210 currently anxious participants with diagnosed GAD who are non-medicated. The study takes place at two sites: the Centre for Human Psychopharmacology (Swinburne University of Technology), Hawthorn, Melbourne, Australia; and the Academic Discipline of Psychiatry (The University of Queensland) based at the Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital, Herston, Brisbane, Australia. Written informed consent will be obtained from each participant prior to commencement in the study. The primary outcome is the Structured Interview Guide for the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (SIGH-A). The secondary outcomes involve a range of scales that assess affective disorder symptoms and quality of life outcomes, in addition to the study of mediating biomarkers of response (assessed via genomics and neuroimaging).DiscussionIf this study demonstrates positive findings in support of the superiority of kava over placebo in the treatment of GAD, and also is shown to be safe, then this plant-medicine can be considered a 'first-line' therapy for GAD. Genomic and neuroimaging data may reveal clinical response patterns and provide more evidence of the neurobiological activity of the plant extract.Trial registration informationClinicalTrials.gov: NCT02219880 Date: 13 August 2014:.

Project description:Avoidance and heightened responses to perceived threats are key features of anxiety disorders. These disorders are characterised by inflexibility in dynamically updating behavioural and physiological responses to aversively conditioned cues or environmental contexts which are no longer objectively threatening, often manifesting in perseverative avoidance. However, less is known about how anxiety disorders might differ in adjusting to threat and safety shifts in the environment or how idiosyncratic avoidance responses are learned and persist. Twenty-eight patients with generalised anxiety disorder (GAD), without DSM co-morbidities, and 27 matched healthy controls were administered two previously established paradigms: Pavlovian threat reversal and shock avoidance habits through overtraining (assessed following devaluation with measures of perseverative responding). For both tasks we used subjective report scales and skin conductance responses (SCR). In the Pavlovian threat reversal task, patients with GAD showed a significantly overall higher SCR as well as a reduced differential SCR response compared to controls in the early but not late reversal phase. During the test of habitual avoidance responding, GAD patients did not differ from controls in task performance, habitual active avoidance responses during devaluation, or corresponding SCR during trials, but showed a trend toward more abstract confirmatory subjective justifications for continued avoidance following the task. GAD patients exhibited significantly greater skin conductance responses to signals of threat than controls, but did not exhibit the major deficits in reversal and safety signal learning shown previously by patients with OCD. Moreover, this patient group, again unlike OCD patients, did not show evidence of altered active avoidance learning or enhanced instrumental avoidance habits. Overall, these findings indicate no deficits in instrumental active avoidance or persistent avoidance habits, despite enhanced responses to Pavlovian threat cues in GAD. They suggest that GAD is characterised by passive, and not excessively rigid, avoidance styles.

Project description:BackgroundBonafide psychotherapy is an effective treatment for generalised anxiety disorder compared to no-treatment. Rather than creating increasing numbers of new overall treatment-packets within a medical meta-model, an additional approach to investigating clinical research designs may be to increase the understanding of already effective psychotherapies. Treatment manuals and protocols allow a relatively high degree of freedom for the way therapists implement the overall treatment manuals. There is a systematic lack of knowledge on how therapists should customise these overall protocols. The present study experimentally examines three ways of conducting a bonafide psychotherapy based on a 15 session time-limited cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) protocol and their relation to the therapists' protocol adherence and treatment efficacy.Methods/designThis trial will investigate three different methods of customising a bonafide CBT-protocol using dyadic peer-tutoring methodology (primings). The individuals with GAD will be randomly assigned to one of three priming conditions (resource priming, supportive resource priming, or adherence priming). The participant treatment allocation will be performed randomly. Therapists will be assigned to a peer-tutoring partner and priming condition based on a mutual agreement. Treatment outcomes will be assessed at the following times: observer based in-session outcomes, session-by-session post-session outcomes, treatment outcome at post assessment and treatment outcome at 6-month follow-up.DiscussionThe proposed trial addresses the clinically relevant question of how to customise a bonafide psychotherapy protocol using tandem peer-tutoring methodology (three priming conditions). Through the development and testing of the proposed priming procedures, this study describes levels of adherence and how to conduct an overall treatment protocol in a more systematised way.Trial registrationFrom ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02039193.

Dataset Information

Physical exercise augmented cognitive behaviour therapy for older adults with generalised anxiety disorder (PEXACOG): study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

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Physical exercise augmented cognitive behaviour therapy for older adults with generalised anxiety disorder (PEXACOG): study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

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