NCT02045771

A Pilot Study to Assess the Effectiveness of BehaviouRal ActiVation Group Program in Patients With dEpression: BRAVE

A Pragmatic Randomized Trial to Investigate the Effectiveness of BehaviouRal ActiVation Group Therapy in Reducing dEpressive Symptoms and Improving Quality of Life in Patients With Depression: BRAVE Pilot Study

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 24 (actual)
• Sponsor: St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

The study's primary goal is to assess the effectiveness of behavioural activation in reducing depressive symptoms and re-integrate patients with depression into their personal and professional lives thus improving quality of life and helping in attaining and maintaining remission of depression. It is aimed at helping patients re-engage with several life areas that they may have lost in the course of depressive illness. The intervention is centred on behavioural activation (BA) with complementary interventions including recreation activities, and behavioural modifications. The study question is: in patients with depressive disorder attending a specialized hospital based mood disorders clinic, does the addition of behavioural activation program delivered in a group format improve depressive symptoms and quality of life compared to treatment as usual after 18 weeks of treatment? Study investigators hypothesize that behavioural activation is an effective treatment for depressive disorder in patients with depression.

Detailed description

This is a pilot study, a mixed-methods design including an open label pragmatic randomized trial and a qualitative grounded theory approach. Participants will be randomized to Behavioural Activation (BA) (intervention) or support group (control) in addition to treatment as usual. The qualitative component will be used to gather participant's experiences, beliefs and opinions about two topics: 1) the experience of participating in the behavioural activation program and 2) their evolving perceptions of their individual depressive illness and quality of life. Based on the analysis of qualitative data pertaining to the first topic, the behavioural activation program may be modified for the main trial, to respond to patient needs and feedback, in the spirit of delivering truly patient centered care. The qualitative study will involve multiple interviews and focus groups which will take place before, during, and after the pilot intervention period.

Conditions

• Depression

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Behavioral Activation	Behavioral activation is a therapy, which has been shown to be quite effective in the treatment of depression (Kanter, Manos et al. 2010; Martell, Dimidjian et al. 2010). Although previous therapies have focused more on the cognitive element, behavioural activation on its own has also been significantly effective for depression treatment (Jacobson, Dobson et al. 1996). The treatment works by increasing behaviours that help a patient with depression interact with an environment and providing consequences to positively reinforce "antidepressant behaviour" (Martell, Dimidjian et al. 2010).
BEHAVIORAL	Support Group	In addition to usual care, the control group will be offered a support group therapy format delivered at the same place, same visit frequency and duration of program as the intervention group. This support group is intended to simulate the intervention group format to minimize risk of biased estimate of BA effectiveness by reducing the potential placebo effect which can be seen due to frequent clinic visits and having additional attention beyond usual care.

Timeline

• Start date: 2014-03-01
• Primary completion: 2017-04-24
• Completion: 2017-04-24
• First posted: 2014-01-27
• Last updated: 2018-05-09

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Canada