NCT05000749

DBT Skills Groups for Veterans at High Risk for Suicide Attempt

A Hybrid Effectiveness-Implementation Multisite Trial of a Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Group for Veterans at High-Risk for Suicide Attempt

• Status: Active Not Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 156 (actual)
• Sponsor: VA Office of Research and Development · Federal
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Veteran suicide death is a national crisis. Risk factors include emotion dysregulation, which occurs across mental health disorders. Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is an evidence-based suicide intervention that targets emotion dysregulation but is resource-intensive and not widely available at VHA. A more efficient evidence-based DBT Skills Group (DBT-SG) is associated with reduced suicidal ideation and emotion dysregulation and likely more feasible to implement at VHA. This is a randomized controlled trial to test whether DBT-SG in addition to VHA treatment-as-usual, compared to only VHA treatment-as-usual, reduces Veteran emotion dysregulation.

Detailed description

This is a randomized controlled trial at four VHA medical centers. Veterans will be randomized to VHA treatment-as-usual or VHA treatment-as-usual plus DBT-SG.

Conditions

• Suicide, Attempted

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	DBT-SG	Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Group (DBT-SG) in addition to VHA treatment as usual. Group is 24 weekly sessions teaching skills in emotion regulation, distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, and mindfulness.
BEHAVIORAL	VHA treatment as usual	VHA treatment as usual for Veterans at risk for suicide attempt

Timeline

• Start date: 2023-04-30
• Primary completion: 2027-02-26
• Completion: 2027-02-26
• First posted: 2021-08-11
• Last updated: 2026-01-22

Locations

5 sites across 1 country: United States