Active clinical trials for "Anxiety Disorders"

In this prospective nonrandomized study the investigators are going to investigate whether auricular acupuncture with indwelling fixed needles is feasible for treatment of preoperative anxiety. Patients, scheduled for ambulatory gynecologic surgery, will be asked, if they wish to receive auricular acupuncture (AA) against preoperative anxiety. The patients who will not wish AA, will be asked to take part in questioning (State-Trait-Anxiety-Inventory (STAI) questionnaire) and will form the control group. The preoperative anxiety using STAI, as well as the duration and quality of sleep on the night before surgery, the incidence of side effects, blood pressure and heart rate will be the outcome measures in this study.

A single blinded controlled trial to determine if an intervention of listening to nursery songs with integrated heart beat sounds results in changes in anxiety level in infants and young children less than four years of age in an emergent setting.

This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of a psychotherapeutic intervention model in nursing on the nursing diagnosis "Anxiety". A randomised controlled trial will be carried out to do so.

Age remains the single most significant risk factor for developing dementia, particularly Alzheimer's dementia (AD). Given the rate at which Canada's population is aging, the quest to determine modifiable risk factors, whether by prevention, earlier detection, or an ability to slow the rate of decline, is a key priority in health care. Primary care is likely to play a pivotal role in this initiative. Collaborative mental health care between primary care providers and mental health clinicians has been demonstrated to be effective at the patient and system levels. Thus, the overall goal of this project is to assess impact and feasibility of implementing a collaborative care evidence-based Integrated Care Pathway (ICP) in addressing three potentially reversible risk factors at high risk for developing AD: anxiety, depression, or mild cognitive impairment (MCI).

The present study seeks to evaluate the clinical utility of repeated transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) by assessing long-term, lasting changes in oscillatory activity and subsequent changes in related behavioral processes of anxious arousal and sensory sensitivity. To date, only transient effects of tACS have been reported, lasting no longer than 30 to 70 minutes. In order to be truly impactful within a clinical setting, however, evidence for long-term effects of tACS is needed.

The goal of this study is to compare the efficacy and mechanisms of change of two self-help books for social anxiety in college students in a randomized controlled trial. One book is based on traditional cognitive behavioral therapy and one is based on acceptance and commitment therapy. This study will test the following hypotheses: Hypothesis 1: The CBT and ACT book conditions will both experience decreased social anxiety and distress. Life satisfaction and values progress will increase in both conditions. Hypothesis 2: The CBT condition will result in greater use of reappraisal, the ACT condition will not. Hypothesis 3: The ACT condition will result in greater use of defusion and decreased psychological inflexibility; the CBT condition will not. Hypothesis 4: Changes in experiential avoidance and defusion will predict changes in social anxiety and values progress in the ACT condition. Hypothesis 5: Changes in reappraisal will predict changes in social anxiety in the CBT condition. Change in values progress will be predicted by change in social anxiety in the CBT condition. Hypothesis 6: The association between social anxiety/negative affect and values progress will decrease or disappear in the ACT condition (i.e., decoupling), and remain the same in the CBT condition.

Anxiety and depression represent the most common mental health problems. Unfortunately, only a minority of people in need will seek or access traditional mental health services. Access to traditional psychological care is even more challenging for linguistic minorities as well as for people living in rural areas and for young adults - a group that has the highest rate of anxiety and depression but the lowest rate of consulting traditional services.Telepsychotherapy can facilitate access to effective psychological care as done in Australia where the government has been offering an evidence-based 8-week online therapy program called the Wellbeing Course. This online course helps people manage worry, stress, anxiety and depression. It has been evaluated in several clinical trials and successfully implemented as an Australian national treatment service. Its transdiagnostic nature, and the fact that the guidance of a clinician is not required for an efficient and safe administration and maintenance of therapeutic gains make it not only a viable option, but also an easily accessible fist line intervention. More recently, findings from a feasibility study conducted by our research laboratory have supported the efficacy of a French-Canadian translation among French-speaking minorities in New-Brunswick. A version of the Wellbeing Course for young adults has been developed called the Mood Mechanic Course. Empirical support has been obtained. This study is a feasibility open trial, the first phase of a 3-phase research program designed to implement a French-Canadian translation of the Mood Mechanic Course in New Brunswick targeting groups for which access to traditional services has been most problematic: youth (18 to 25 years old), people living in rural areas and linguistic minorities. The course is an 8-week week program based on principles of cognitive behaviour therapy. It includes five online lessons, do-it-yourself exercises, case stories, and additional resources on different topic such as sleep hygiene. Twenty young adults will be recruited across New Brunswick among French-Canadian minority communities. Self-report measures assessing anxiety and depression will be administered pre/post treatment and at a 3-month follow-up. It is expected that the course will help overcome barriers in help seeking to improve the mental health of our communities.

Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is a condition characterized by chronic and excessive worry and anxiety. Over the past 15 years, the investigators have developed a cognitive-behavioural treatment that leads to the remission of GAD in approximately 60% to 75% of affected individuals. Although these numbers are encouraging, there remain a considerable proportion of patients who do not fully benefit from treatment. With the goal of improving treatment efficacy, the investigators have recently carried out a series of related studies on the way individuals with GAD and high worriers process uncertain or ambiguous information from their environment. The findings show that these individuals display biases in attention for, and appraisal of, uncertain or ambiguous information. Specifically, individuals with GAD and high worriers preferentially allocate their attention to uncertainty-related stimuli and appraise ambiguous information in a threatening manner. In this study, the investigators examine the impact of these information processing biases, measured at intake, on the efficacy of cognitive-behavioural treatment for GAD. The investigators also examine the impact of residual information processing biases, measured at posttreatment, on the maintenance of treatment gains over 18 months following treatment. The main hypotheses are (1) that high levels of pretreatment biases will predict poorer outcomes immediately following therapy, and (2) that high levels of posttreatment biases will predict relapse during the 18 months following therapy. If, as expected, information processing biases predict poor short- and long-term treatment outcomes for individuals with GAD, the investigators will expand the treatment to integrate strategies that directly target these biases in order to increase its efficacy.

The purpose of this study is to develop and test a mindfulness and loving-kindness based intervention, Positive Affect Training (PAT), to enhance positive affect such as compassion, love, and gratitude and reduce symptoms of social anxiety disorder (SAD). PAT involves a combination of practicing mindfulness meditation and loving kindness meditation in groups. Although PAT has been shown to be effective for dysthymic disorder, one area that remains unclear is whether the PAT protocol for SAD can address the social anxiety symptoms in Japanese adults with SAD. The goal of the research is to test the initial feasibility and efficacy in increasing positive affect and decreasing negative affect in individuals recruited from the general community who are social anxious. If PAT is also effective for Japanese SAD patients, it could be more cost-effective and noninvasive option to address social anxiety disorder.

Clinically significant anxiety affects up to 20% of preschool-aged children and often fails to respond to currently available treatments. Emerging science suggests that increasing brain capacity for "effortful control" (EC) may help anxious children to regulate emotion and behavior to improve outcomes. Thus, in the proposed study, children will be trained on EC tasks (including selective attention, response inhibition, etc.) to increase capacity for effortful control (EC) over fear behaviors. To determine whether EC training improves brain capacity to regulate fear, investigators will assess neurophysiological and behavioral indices of effortful control and fear reactivity before and after this training.