Active clinical trials for "Problem Behavior"

Background:The quality of attachment is greatly influenced by parental sensitivity. Attachment based interventions are designed to promote parental sensitivity, to change parental mental representations and to improve understanding of the developmental needs of the child. Very few studies have investigated the effect of attachment-based interventions on psychiatric symptoms in children. Targeting parental sensitivity and the parent-child interaction might have an important impact on psychiatric symptoms in a clinical sample of children referred to child psychiatric services. Objectives: The primary objective is to investigate whether Circle of Security-Parenting (COS-P) has an effect on parental sensitivity in parents of children referred to child psychiatric services. The secondary objectives are to investigate the effect on children's behavioral and emotional symptoms and the parental stress and reflective functioning after 10 weeks of intervention and at the 24 week follow-up. The study is also exploring the effect of parental attachment style, parental stress and parental psychopathology on the effect of the intervention. Methods: The trial will include 128 families of children (age 3-8 years) who are referred to child psychiatric services in a randomized and controlled design. Included families will be randomized to COS-P+ Treatment as Usual (TAU) or TAU only. Perspectives: Considering the important impact of the quality of the parent-child relationship on the child's well-being, it is essential to target it in interventions and to investigate the relation with psychiatric symptoms. Generally there is a lack of interventions targeting parental sensitivity in psychiatric child populations. Working with the parents on the child-parent relation, might have an important impact on their children's current psychiatric symptoms and could additionally prevent future psychopathology.

Sleep disorders commonly co-occur with psychiatric disorders. Sleep disorders are often treated with medication or not at all in psychiatric care, although there exist a plethora of documentation of the effectiveness of sleep interventions. There is also an increase in studies showing effectiveness of sleep-interventions when the sleep disorder co-occurs with psychiatric illness. The most common and best documented treatment for insomnia is cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBTi). There is a great gap in the knowledge on how sleep disorders can be treated effectively in psychiatric care. In this project the investigators therefore seek to investigate the effect of non-pharmacological, group-based treatment in a randomized controlled trial (RCT) where sleep and psychiatric symptoms are the primary outcome measures. CBTi comprise of sleep education, sleep restriction, stimulus control and cognitive restructuring of dysfunctional thoughts about sleep.

In a prior application (MH064372), the investigators' treatment research program (Services for Kids In Primary-care, SKIP) developed and tested a chronic care model-based intervention, called Doctor Office Collaborative Care (DOCC), that was found to be effective in the management of childhood behavior problems and comorbid ADHD. In the "SKIP for PA Study", the investigators propose to conduct a randomized clinical trial to evaluate the effects of team- and practice leadership-level implementation strategies designed to enhance the use and uptake of DOCC in diverse pediatric primary care offices.

The goal of this investigator-initiated, randomized, blinded, 3-armed placebo-controlled, pragmatic, clinical superiority trial is to examine the efficacy of melatonin or low-dose quetiapine versus placebo for treatment of insomnia in patients with psychiatric disorders. The aims of the study are: To examine the efficacy of melatonin or low-dose quetiapine versus placebo for treatment of insomnia To examine how melatonin or low-dose quetiapine affects global symptom severity, sleep quality, psychosocial functioning and subjective well-being. Participants will receive six weeks of treatment with either melatonin, quetiapine or placebo followed by a brief taper off.

Agitation and aggression impose a tremendous burden on the individuals living with dementia, their families, caregivers, and healthcare systems. Neuropsychiatric symptoms of dementia (NPS) affect up to 80% of patients with Alzheimer's dementia (AD). The mechanisms of agitation in AD are poorly understood and the current interventions are only modestly effective while having serious adverse effects. In this study, the investigators propose to assess the mechanisms and treatment of neuropsychiatric symptoms in AD with the use of non-invasive, brain stimulation approaches. By applying magnetic stimulation to the surface of the head (transcranial magnetic stimulation - TMS) combined with electroencephalography (EEG), the investigators will be able to study the mechanisms of agitation and advance our understanding of AD. Further, the investigators will evaluate if transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is effective to treat agitation dementia.

This study has two phases: Phase 1 is to examine blood pressure, microvascular function, and sympathetic nerve activity in mid-life adult binge drinkers vs. alcohol abstainers/moderate drinkers. Phase 2 is to examine the effect of 8-week aerobic exercise training on blood pressure, microvascular function, and sympathetic nerve activity in mid-life adult binge drinkers

The purpose of this randomized, sham-controlled study is to evaluate the effectiveness of DBS therapy in individuals suffering from severe OCD and to investigate DBS treatment with functional [18F]FDG-Brain-PET.

The aim of this study is to examine the effects of Mentalization Based Therapy (MBT) for foster families in Denmark on child mental health and well-being, parental stress, mental health, and reflective function, parental mind-mindedness and the parent-child relationship.

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) offers robust vocational programming that have helped countless Veterans obtain competitive employment; however, these services are not uniformly effective as recent data suggests that only 35 to 43% of Veterans are competitively employed at time of discharge. For those who become competitively employed, job tenure may be brief, which is often attenuated by underemployment or poor person-job fit. Moreover, only 3.5% of Veterans experiencing vocational problems engage in vocational services offered by the VHA. On average, it takes Veterans more than four years to utilize vocational services. These Veterans are at high risk of acquiring multiple functional losses and developing chronic disabilities as their vocational needs go unmet for years. Research suggests that intrinsic factors like lacking clear vocational goals, perceiving barriers to employment, and negative beliefs about one's ability to work contribute to low engagement, outcomes, and tenure of some consumers of vocational rehabilitation services. Thus, the VA may be able to improve vocational engagement, outcomes, and tenure of Veterans with psychiatric disorders by enhancing vocational services with added interventions targeting unhelpful psychological factors. Career counseling and development services have been shown to be effective in helping civilian populations clarify vocational goals and identity, enhance vocational self-efficacy, and increase proactive vocational behaviors in the face of obstacles. Additionally, career counseling and development services help facilitate greater "match" between a person and their job, and person-job match is a key determinant of long-term career tenure among individual with psychiatric disorders. The researchers of this project propose a three-aim study to develop a career counseling and development intervention for Veterans with psychiatric disorders (Purposeful Pathways). The first aim will focus on the design and development of the Purposeful Pathways intervention with veteran and provider input (n=16). The second aim will pilot test the intervention in an open trial (n=10) to gather Veteran input on the initial intervention. The third and final aim will consist of a feasibility pilot randomized controlled trial (n=50) to examine acceptability and feasibility outcomes and to explore the impact of the Purposeful Pathways intervention in terms of functional improvement and other vocational outcomes. Purposeful Pathways consists of up to 12 individual sessions that will be offered concurrently with existing VHA vocational rehabilitation services, (e.g., transitional work experience [TWE]). The final product of this study is to produce a manual of Purposeful Pathways, and corresponding fidelity monitoring checklist, to be tested later in a larger efficacy trial.

Comorbid insomnia represents a frequent health problem in patients with severe mental disorders, and cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) has been identified as the first line treatment. However, CBT-I has not sufficiently been implemented in acute psychiatry settings. Rather, patients are often overtreated with benzodiazepines or benzodiazepine receptor agonists, related to adverse effects and the risk of tolerance and dependency. This work aims to empower patients with severe mental disorders to take care of their own sleep health based on a pragmatic behavioral treatment program ("Become your own SLEEPexpert"). Implementation research strategies in collaboration with patients and health care providers were used to adaptat CBT-I components to the needs of psychiatric inpatients. Evidence for feasibility in an acute hospital setting and preliminary evidence for efficacy has been shown. ln the proposed project, the investigators aim to compare treatment as usual (TAU) + SLEEPexpert to TAU + sleep monitoring in a pilot randomized controlled trial. The objective is to target sleep to improve mental health and to investigate the efficacy of the SLEEPexpert programme for the improvement of sleep and mental health. Given the high burden of comorbid insomnia in psychiatry, the investigators believe that the presented work is of interest to basic scientists and clinicians and, potentially, of heightened public health relevance.