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Randomized Control Trial of Group Intervention With Former War-affected Boys in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Q

Queen's University Belfast

Status and phase

Completed
Phase 2

Conditions

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
Conduct Disorder
Depression

Treatments

Behavioral: TF-CBT

Study type

Interventional

Funder types

Other

Identifiers

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to evaluate, in a randomised control trial (RCT), the effectiveness of group-based, trauma-focused Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (TF-CBT) in reducing psychological distress in former child soldiers and other war-affected children in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Full description

To the best of the author's knowledge this is the first group-based mental health or psychosocial intervention developed specifically for psychologically distressed former child soldiers. While CBT is the modality with most empirical evidence for treating war-affected young people, this is the first evaluation with child soldiers specifically.

Former child soldiers and war affected 'street boys' (aged 13-17) in eastern DRC, will be screened for symptoms of psychological distress and then randomly assigned to either a treatment group or a waiting-list control. The treatment groups will receive a 15-session manualised, culturally-adapted, TF-CBT intervention. This includes psycho-education, relaxation, affect modulation, cognitive processing and constructing a trauma narrative. After treatment and post-testing, the waiting-list controls then begin their intervention.

Enrollment

58 patients

Sex

Male

Ages

13 to 17 years old

Volunteers

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

  • War-affected children and adolescents

Exclusion criteria

  • No traumatic war events experienced
  • Psychosis
  • Inability to speak Swahili, French or English

Trial design

Primary purpose

Treatment

Allocation

Randomized

Interventional model

Parallel Assignment

Masking

Single Blind

58 participants in 2 patient groups

TF-CBT
Experimental group
Treatment:
Behavioral: TF-CBT
Waiting List control
No Intervention group

Trial contacts and locations

0

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Data sourced from clinicaltrials.gov

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