Mind-Body Skills Groups for the Treatment of War Zone Stress in Military and Veteran Populations

The Center for Mind-Body Medicine

Status: Completed

Conditions: Brain Injuries; Stress Disorders, Post Traumatic; Anger; Anxiety Disorders; Depressive Disorder

Treatments: Behavioral: Mind-Body Skills Groups; Other: Standard Treatment

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; Other U.S. Federal agency

Identifiers

NCT01093053

08144040

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to determine whether participation in mind-body skills groups by veterans who have experienced a stressful war-related situation and have symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), will improve symptoms of PTSD, depression and anxiety, reduce anger, improve quality of life, quality of sleep and result in posttraumatic growth (a positive change that people can experience when they have been in a traumatic situation).

Full description

The study will be a randomized controlled study where participants will be randomly selected to either participate in the mind-body skills program and to answer questionnaires before and after the program and again 6 months later or, if they are not randomized to the mind-body skills group program, they will answer the questionnaires during the same time periods without participating in the program. Both groups will also continue their medical treatment as usual. The mind-body skills group intervention consists of groups of 8-10 participants. Two formats will be offered. (1) A 2 hour group session once a week for 10 weeks or (2) Weekend groups which will be run on alternating Saturdays, with a 2 hour session in the morning and another 2 hour session in the afternoon. The groups will be run for a total of 5 Saturday sessions. Additional "reunion" groups will be held at 1 month, 3 months, and 6 months in order to reinforce skills and to provide continuing social support.

Enrollment: 108 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• having experienced a deployment-related criterion A stressor and reporting post deployment stress symptoms which include: clinically diagnosed posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), or subthreshold PTSD symptoms
• comorbid conditions may also include mild traumatic brain injury, or clinically significant levels of depression or anxiety.

Exclusion criteria

• current uncontrolled psychotic or bipolar disorder
• significant cognitive impairment
• moderate or severe TBI
• substance dependence
• suicidal or homicidal ideation

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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108 participants in 2 patient groups

Mind-Body Skills Groups

Experimental group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Mind-Body Skills Groups

Standard Treatment

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Other: Standard Treatment