Family Based Cognitive-Behavioral Treatment for Preschoolers With Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

March 24, 2014 updated by: Adam Lewin, University of South Florida
The purpose of this research study is to further investigate how well cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy works to reduce obsessive-compulsive symptoms in young children with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Cognitive-behavioral therapy has been shown to work well in youth with OCD and other anxiety disorders; however, there are only a few studies to date in preschool and young children with OCD. All children will have the option to receive 12 twice-weekly cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy sessions that are up to 60-minutes each. Randomly determined, half of all children will receive these sessions immediately following the pre-assessment and the remaining half will receive them after six weeks. The investigators expect that youth receiving the study-based therapy will show more improvement in OCD symptoms in six weeks in contrast to youth waiting to receive the therapy.

Study Overview

Status

Status

Indicates the current recruitment status or the expanded access status.
Completed

Conditions

Conditions

The disease, disorder, syndrome, illness, or injury that is being studied. On ClinicalTrials.gov, conditions may also include other health-related issues, such as lifespan, quality of life, and health risks.

Intervention / Treatment

Intervention / Treatment

A process or action that is the focus of a clinical study. Interventions include drugs, medical devices, procedures, vaccines, and other products that are either investigational or already available. Interventions can also include noninvasive approaches, such as education or modifying diet and exercise.

Detailed Description

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for OCD includes several core therapeutic elements including establishment of treatment goals, assigned homework, operant conditioning paradigms (the putative mechanism for exposure-based therapies), provision of psychoeducation (e.g., the link between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors), cognitive (e.g., cognitive restructuring) and behavioral (e.g., exposure) coping skill implementation, and target behavior progress assessments. Nevertheless, research is lacking in preschoolers with OCD and these children likely require adaptations to the traditional CBT regimen. Preschoolers often have a high level of family accommodation, whereby the family members become part of the rituals and compulsions in attempt to ease the young child's anxiety. CBT with preschoolers will need to emphasize delivering intervention within the context of the family. The flexibility of this modular approach for treatment (modular therapies allow for variations in the order and intensiveness of the aforementioned treatment elements, providing an individually tailored treatment instead of a one-size-fits-all approach) may be optimally suited for preschoolers with OCD given their wide variability in developmental level and symptom presentation. This is consistent with the NIH Roadmap Initiative which calls for personalized interventions matched to individual patient characteristics. Our OCD research team in the Rothman Center is highly experienced in clinical research for pediatric and adult OCD. The proposed investigation is a single-site controlled trial of CBT in preschool aged youth with OCD aged 3-8 years. We will randomly assign patients to immediate treatment or 6-week Treatment as Usual (TAU) control. A manualized CBT protocol will be followed. Assessments will occur at Screening, Baseline, Post-treatment and 1 and 3-month follow-ups. Ratings of patient OCD symptom severity will be conducted at each time point by trained raters blinded to treatment condition. Diagnosis will be established by an experienced clinician and verified by a validated rating scale conducted with the child's parent(s); cases will be reviewed by study investigators. Assessments will be audio-recorded and verified for integrity. Randomization will be determined immediately following the baseline assessment; patients will be assigned TAU or immediate treatment in a 1:1 ratio. All eligible patients will receive 12 therapy sessions over 6 weeks using the evidence-based treatment protocol that incorporates E/RP and parent involvement; sessions are twice weekly for 60 minutes. Dr. Lewin and other trained OCD therapists under his supervision will conduct therapy sessions. All sessions are audiorecorded for integrity.

Study Type

Study Type

Describes the nature of a clinical study. Study types include interventional studies (also called clinical trials), observational studies (including patient registries), and expanded access.
Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

Enrollment

The number of participants in a clinical study. The "anticipated" enrollment is the target number of participants that the researchers need for the study.
31

Phase

Phase

The stage of a clinical trial studying a drug or biological product, based on definitions developed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The phase is based on the study's objective, the number of participants, and other characteristics. There are five phases: Early Phase 1 (formerly listed as Phase 0), Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3, and Phase 4. Not Applicable is used to describe trials without FDA-defined phases, including trials of devices or behavioral interventions.
  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Florida
      • St. Petersburg, Florida, United States, 33701
        • University of South Florida - Rothman Center for Neuropsychiatry

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

The key requirements that people who want to participate in a clinical study must meet or the characteristics they must have. Eligibility criteria consist of both inclusion criteria (which are required for a person to participate in the study) and exclusion criteria (which prevent a person from participating). Types of eligibility criteria include whether a study accepts healthy volunteers, has age or age group requirements, or is limited by sex.

Ages Eligible for Study

3 years to 8 years (Child)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Meets DSM-IV-TR for a primary diagnosis of OCD
  • Minimum score of 8 on the CYBOCS compulsion scale
  • Peabody Picture Vocabulary IV score of 80
  • Able to attend biweekly appointments with a parent/guardian
  • English Speaking

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Current clinically significant suicidality
  • engaged in suicidal behaviors within 6 months
  • Peabody Picture Vocabulary IV score of 80
  • Any change in established psychotropic medication (e.g., antidepressants, anxiolytics) within 4 weeks before study enrollment, any change in antipsychotics within 3 weeks prior to the screening assessment, any change in Prozac or Straterra within 6 weeks of study enrollment, and any change in alpha-2 agonists or stimulants within 1 week of study enrollment.
  • Lifetime DSM-IV bipolar, schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorders; or Substance abuse in past 6 months.
  • Absence of language
  • Formal diagnosis of mental retardation or an autism spectrum disorder
  • Unwillingness of parents to make the commitment to accompany their child for multiple study visits, unwillingness to take part in randomization, inability to attend sessions twice weekly as therapist availability allows, inability to attend assessment visits.
  • Presence of a significant and/or unstable medical illness which might lead to hospitalization during the study.

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm

Participant Group / Arm

A group or subgroup of participants in a clinical trial that receives a specific intervention/treatment, or no intervention, according to the trial's protocol.
Intervention / Treatment

Intervention / Treatment

A process or action that is the focus of a clinical study. Interventions include drugs, medical devices, procedures, vaccines, and other products that are either investigational or already available. Interventions can also include noninvasive approaches, such as education or modifying diet and exercise.
No Intervention: Treatment as Usual
Participants randomized to the TAU arm will be instructed to continue receiving their prior interventions as recommended by their providers (e.g., psychotherapy, social skills training, behavioral interventions, family participation in family therapy or a parenting class, or pharmacological interventions). Treatment changes (e.g., medication increase, starting psychotherapy in the community) are not prohibited and will be monitored. Thus, treatment will continue as it would in standard practice.
Experimental: Immediate CBT
Therapists will work with families for 12 twice weekly sessions, each lasting up to 60 minutes implementing a developmentally appropriate modulated cognitive behavioral therapy approach. A manualized CBT protocol will be followed.
Behavioral: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Family based cognitive behavioral therapy with exposure and response prevention. Twice weekly for 45-60 minute visits.
Other Names:
  • ERP - Exposure response prevention

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Primary Outcome Measures

In a clinical study's protocol, the planned outcome measure that is the most important for evaluating the effect of an intervention/treatment. Most clinical studies have one primary outcome measure, but some have more than one.
Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Clinician Global Impression - Improvement Scale (Measure of patient improvement at relevent timepoints)
Time Frame: Baseline/Post-treatment or Post-waitlist/1 and 3 Month Follow-up
The CGI is a 7-point rating of treatment response anchored by 1 ("very much improved), 4 ("no change") and 7 ("very much worse"). Youth being rated by the IE as 1 ("very much improved") and 2 ("much improved") will be considered treatment responders. This measure assesses change or improvement across time and consequently is appropriate for use at multiple assessments - reflects patient improvement relative to baseline functioning. Represents change in functioning and assesses change in baseline. Appropriate for use at multiple time-points.
Baseline/Post-treatment or Post-waitlist/1 and 3 Month Follow-up

Secondary Outcome Measures

Secondary Outcome Measures

In a clinical study's protocol, a planned outcome measure that is not as important as the primary outcome measure for evaluating the effect of an intervention but is still of interest. Most clinical studies have more than one secondary outcome measure.
Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
CYBOCS - Childrens Yale Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale
Time Frame: Baseline, post-treatment/post waitlist, 1 and 3 month followup

The CY-BOCS is a 10-item semi-structured measure of obsession and compulsion severity over the previous week. Measure will be administered to the parent.

Change score (calculated as a percent change from baseline) will be used as the outcome measure.
Baseline, post-treatment/post waitlist, 1 and 3 month followup

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Sponsor

The organization or person who initiates the study and who has authority and control over the study.
University of South Florida

Investigators

Investigators

A researcher involved in a clinical study. Related terms include site principal investigator, site sub-investigator, study chair, study director, and study principal investigator.
  • Principal Investigator: Adam B Lewin, Ph.D., University of South Florida

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

Study Start

The actual date on which the first participant was enrolled in a clinical study. The "anticipated" study start date is the date that the researchers think will be the study start date.
May 1, 2011

Primary Completion (Actual)

Primary Completion

The date on which the last participant in a clinical study was examined or received an intervention to collect final data for the primary outcome measure. Whether the clinical study ended according to the protocol or was terminated does not affect this date. For clinical studies with more than one primary outcome measure with different completion dates, this term refers to the date on which data collection is completed for all the primary outcome measures. The "anticipated" primary completion date is the date that the researchers think will be the primary completion date for the study.
June 1, 2013

Study Completion (Actual)

Study Completion

The date on which the last participant in a clinical study was examined or received an intervention/treatment to collect final data for the primary outcome measures, secondary outcome measures, and adverse events (that is, the last participant's last visit). The "anticipated" study completion date is the date that the researchers think will be the study completion date.
March 1, 2014

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

First Submitted

The date on which the study sponsor or investigator first submitted a study record to ClinicalTrials.gov. There is typically a delay of a few days between the first submitted date and the record's availability on ClinicalTrials.gov (the first posted date).
September 29, 2011

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

The date on which the study sponsor or investigator first submits a study record that is consistent with National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review criteria. The sponsor or investigator may need to revise and submit a study record one or more times before NLM's QC review criteria are met. It is the responsibility of the sponsor or investigator to ensure that the study record is consistent with the NLM QC review criteria.
October 5, 2011

First Posted (Estimate)

First Posted

The date on which the study record was first available on ClinicalTrials.gov after National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review has concluded. There is typically a delay of a few days between the date the study sponsor or investigator submitted the study record and the first posted date.
October 6, 2011

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

Last Update Posted

The most recent date on which changes to a study record were made available on ClinicalTrials.gov. There may be a delay between when the changes were submitted to ClinicalTrials.gov by the study's sponsor or investigator (the last update submitted date) and the last update posted date.
March 26, 2014

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

The most recent date on which the study sponsor or investigator submitted changes to a study record that are consistent with National Library of Medicine (NLM) quality control (QC) review criteria. It is the responsibility of the sponsor or investigator to ensure that the study record is consistent with the NLM QC review criteria.
March 24, 2014

Last Verified

Last Verified

The most recent date on which the study sponsor or investigator confirmed the information about a clinical study on ClinicalTrials.gov as accurate and current. If a study with a recruitment status of recruiting; not yet recruiting; or active, not recruiting has not been confirmed within the past 2 years, the study's recruitment status is shown as unknown.
March 1, 2014

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

Other Study ID Numbers

Identifiers or ID numbers other than the NCT number that are assigned to a clinical study by the study's sponsor, funders, or others. These numbers may include unique identifiers from other trial registries and National Institutes of Health grant numbers.
  • YC-OCD

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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