Brain Plasticity Underlying Acquisition of New Organizational Skills in Children-R61 Phase

September 27, 2019 updated by: NYU Langone Health

Brain Plasticity Underlying Acquisition of New Organizational Skills in Children

Organizational, time management and planning (OTMP) skills deficits are seriously impairing features of developmental disorders, such as Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) and autism, which compromise school performance and family relations. The manualized Organizational Skills Training program (OST) was designed to target children's specific OTMP deficits. However, the brain mechanisms of treatment-induced changes remain unknown. The current study combines a training intervention with non-invasive MRI imaging in a pre-/post-design to address this question.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

42

Phase

  • 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

    • New York
      • New York, New York, United States, 10016
        • New York University School of Medicine

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

Ages Eligible for Study

4 years to 7 years (Child)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Age at entry: age ≥ 8.0 and ≤ 11.9 years corresponding to grades 3-5
  • Written assent by child and consent by parent or legal guardian
  • IQ: Estimated full scale IQ ≥ 85 and language comprehension scores ≥ 80 is required as in past studies to assure that children are able to comply with specific skills training and to minimize neurobiological heterogeneity
  • Organizational skills deficits defined as elevated (≥ 1SD) pre-treatment COSS Parent Total T-score and at least one COSS Parent Interference item rated as either a 3 or 4 (indicating an above-average level of impairment)
  • Handedness: given the greater prevalence of non-right-handedness in neurodevelopmental disorders, we will track handedness but not exclude left-handed individuals
  • Medication: To minimize variability due to medication effects, we will preferentially recruit currently unmedicated individuals (no psychoactive medications in the previous 3 months). For stimulants, we will require that dosage be stable for >1 month before study entry and parents will be asked to consult their physician regarding discontinuation for 48 hours before evaluation, mock scanning and scanning sessions.
  • Must provide adequate MRI data at baseline

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Enrolled in a self-contained special education classroom or served by a 1:1 paraprofessional in their classroom
  • A learning disability on Individualized Education Plan
  • Absence of signed consent by parent or legal guardian
  • Children who dissent regardless of parental permission
  • Full scale IQ < 85
  • Participants for whom stimulant discontinuation for 48 hours prior to evaluation, mock scan and scanning sessions is deemed medically impermissible
  • Children with a recent (past 6 months) or current history of neuroleptic treatment or current treatment with psychotropic medications other than stimulants
  • Per history (and medical records if needed) medical illness requiring chronic current treatment
  • History of intrathecal chemotherapy or focal cranial irradiation
  • Premature birth (< 32 weeks estimated gestational age or birth weight < 1500g)
  • History of leukomalacia or static encephalopathy, intracerebral hemorrhage beyond grade 2, other specific or focal neurological or metabolic disorder including epilepsy (except for resolved febrile seizures)
  • History of traumatic brain injury
  • Contraindication for MRI scanning (metal implants, pacemakers, metal foreign bodies or pregnancy)

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: N/A
  • Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: OST Intervention
12 weekly in-person sessions, each lasting approximately 1 hour, targeting 3 core organizational skills domains-Tracking Assignments, Managing Materials and Time Management
Will undergo two magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) sessions: one within 2 weeks prior to OST treatment and one within 2 weeks of completion of the OST treatment.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Change in parent Children's Organizational Skills Scales (COSS-P) total T-scores following OST intervention.
Time Frame: Day 1
Parents (COSS-P) and teachers (COSS-T) will serve as informants (only the child is a study subject) who will provide baseline and outcome ratings.
Day 1

Collaborators and Investigators

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

Sponsor

Collaborators

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Francisco X Castellanos, MD, NYU Langone Health

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 (Actual)

September 8, 2017

Primary Completion (Actual)

May 1, 2019

Study Completion (Actual)

May 1, 2019

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

May 9, 2017

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

May 9, 2017

First Posted (Actual)

May 11, 2017

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

October 1, 2019

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 27, 2019

Last Verified

September 1, 2019

More Information

Terms related to this study

Other Study ID Numbers

  • R61/17-00263
  • R61MH113663 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

Yes

IPD Plan Description

De-identified individual participant data will be provided to the National Database for Clinical Trials Related to Mental Illness (NDCT) for sharing to other researchers.

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

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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