The Evaluation of Therapeutic Efficacy on the Integrated Group Psychotherapy for Patients With Schizophrenia

Department of Psychiatry of NTUH Yun-Lin Branch

Although the patients with schizophrenia can be treated with new generation of antipsychotics medication, additional approaches are necessary to improve schizophrenics' cognitive functions, interpersonal relationships as well as social adjustment. When some of patients return to community, they expose to practical pressure that contribute to worsen and relapse of disease. That further damages patient's cognitive functions. Integrated Psychological Therapy(IPT) on treating schizophrenia has dramatic improvement in recent years; it has formed structured treatment gradually on relieving illusion, hallucination as well as negative symptoms. This study aims at conducting 12-week structured IPT group therapy. The intended subjects are patients, met with DSM-Ⅳ-TR diagnosis of schizophrenia, from community, outpatient and inpatient service. The overall treatments are designed to provide 1-2 hours weekly group therapy which focuses on relieving illusions, hallucination, and negative symptoms. Patients' cognitive functions, ability of emotional adjustment and interpersonal relationship would be evaluated in pre-test and post-test to indicate whether the significant difference exists. There is a controlled group, in which patients who still receive treatment as usual (TAU). The study also compares the evaluation results between IPT group and TAU group, hoping to develop the therapeutic framework for Taiwan people with schizophrenia.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Schizophrenia
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Group Psychotherapy

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 50
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Taiwan
  • Yun-lin, Taiwan, 64001
    • National Taiwan University Hospital Yun-Lin Branch

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years to 80 years (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• schizophrenia,
• can concentrate in group for 30 minutes.

Exclusion Criteria:

• substance abuse (alcohol, illegal medication),
• self harm history.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Other: Arm; There is no arm in this study.	Behavioral: Group Psychotherapy; integrated group psychotherapy, including the interpersonal and cognitive group therapy

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
re-hospitalization rate	acute symptom relapse and needed to be admitted to the acute ward	after 3 months of the group psychotherapy

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Cognitive functions, ability of emotional adjustment, and interpersonal relationship	The tests of psychiatric symptoms, cognitive test, anxiety, depression, interpsersonal skill, and emotional adjustment Add Secondary Outcome Measure:The Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale, Beck depression scale, Beck anxiety scale, Beck suicial ideation scale, Cognitive tests (visual spatial test), CPT-IP for attention test	12 months of the group tpsychotherapy
The Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale, Beck depression scale, Beck anxiety scale, Beck suicial ideation scale, Cognitive tests (visual spatial test), CPT-IP for attention test	The Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale for psychiatric symptoms, Beck depression scale for depression symptoms, Beck anxiety scale for anxiety symptoms, Beck suicial ideation scale for suicidal ideation evalution Cognitive tests (visual spatial test), CPT-IP for attention test for cognitive function	12 months of the group psychotherapy

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: National Taiwan University Hospital
• Collaborators: Kaohsiung Medical University
• Investigators: Study Director: Li-Ren Chang, MD, Department of Psychiatry in National Taiwan University Hospital Yun-Lin Branch

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: May 1, 2010
• Primary Completion (Actual): May 1, 2011
• Study Completion (Actual): May 1, 2011

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: June 7, 2010
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 7, 2010
• First Posted (Estimate): June 8, 2010

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimate): December 27, 2012
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: December 26, 2012
• Last Verified: November 1, 2012

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Mental Disorders; Schizophrenia Spectrum and Other Psychotic Disorders; Schizophrenia
• Other Study ID Numbers: 201003068R