NCT01959126

Health Enhancement And Resilience Training

The Effect of a Stress Reduction Program Using Mindfulness Techniques on Markers of Cellular Stress and Aging

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 70 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of California, San Francisco · Academic / Other
• Sex: Female
• Age: 20 Years – 50 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The purpose of this research study is to examine whether a stress reduction intervention can improve health, mood and biological markers of cellular stress and aging in a group of chronically-stressed maternal caregivers and healthy maternal controls.

Detailed description

This stress-reduction intervention was added into an ongoing observational study in May of 2013. The parent study is a prospective cohort study of the effects of chronic stress in a group of maternal caregivers with children on the autism spectrum and healthy controls whose children have no diagnosis. Study participants are being invited to enroll in a 12-week stress reduction course based on the principles of mindfulness. They will attend four six-hour workshops and participate in 12 weekly hour-long web video conferencing calls to reinforce what is taught in the workshops. At the beginning and the end of the intervention, they complete self-report measures of psychological well-being and give saliva samples. Since the women are also participating in the longitudinal study, we have other before and after data for them. These include psycho-social measures, body measurements, psycho-physiology measurements, cognitive tests, actigraphy (for sleep), as well as saliva (for hormones), hair (for hormones) and blood (for telomeres, telomerase, gene expression, circulating hormones, inflammation and oxidative stress).

Conditions

• Stress
• Aging
• Well-being

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Stress-reduction class	Study participants enrolled in a 12-week stress reduction course based on the principles of mindfulness. They attended four six-hour workshops and participated in 12 weekly hour-long web video conferencing calls to reinforce what was taught in the workshops. We have two groups: chronically-stressed maternal caregivers of children on the autism spectrum and control mothers whose children have no significant psychiatric or physical impairment. Both groups received similar instruction.

Timeline

• Start date: 2013-05-01
• Primary completion: 2015-11-01
• Completion: 2015-11-01
• First posted: 2013-10-09
• Last updated: 2021-01-26

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States