Predicting depression outcomes throughout inpatient treatment using the general and specific personality disorder factors.

BACKGROUND: Clinical intuition suggests that personality disorders hinder the treatment of depression, but research findings are mixed. One reason for this might be the way in which current assessment measures conflate general aspects of personality disorders, such as overall severity, with specific aspects, such as stylistic tendencies. The goal of this study was to clarify the unique contributions of the general and specific aspects of personality disorders to depression outcomes. METHODS: Patients admitted to the Menninger Clinic, Houston, between 2012 and 2015 (N = 2352) were followed over a 6-8-week course of multimodal inpatient treatment. Personality disorder symptoms were assessed with the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition Axis II Personality Screening Questionnaire at admission, and depression severity was assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 every fortnight. General and specific personality disorder factors estimated with a confirmatory bifactor model were used to predict latent growth curves of depression scores in a structural equation model. RESULTS: The general factor predicted higher initial depression scores but not different rates of change. By contrast, the specific borderline factor predicted slower rates of decline in depression scores, while the specific antisocial factor predicted a U shaped pattern of change. CONCLUSIONS: Personality disorder symptoms are best represented by a general factor that reflects overall personality disorder severity, and specific factors that reflect unique personality styles. The general factor predicts overall depression severity while specific factors predict poorer prognosis which may be masked in prior studies that do not separate the two.

A comparison of completion and recovery rates between first-line protocol-based cognitive behavioural therapy and non-manualized relational therapies within a UK psychological service.

This study compares completion and recovery rates between protocol-based cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), offered as a first-line therapy for common mental health problems as per national guidelines, and relational therapies (RTs), scarcely provided in the English Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme. This is a non-randomized, naturalistic study in a treatment-seeking community sample (n = 708). RTs consist of brief psychodynamic and relational integrative therapy. Completion rates relied on clinicians' coding and recovery rates were calculated based on the Patient Health Questionnaires-9 and the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7. Doubly robust regression analysis was used to control both the treatment allocation and outcome variables for pretreatment differences between the intervention groups. Significantly more RT clients completed treatment compared with CBT clients. No significant differences in recovery rates between CBT and RTs were found using traditional null hypothesis significance tests; the groups were found to be equivalent using equivalence tests. Only when the analysis was repeated in treatment completers did CBT clients achieve around one-quarter higher recovery rates. Both CBT and RTs appeared to be equally effective and showed recovery and completion rates equivalent to or above the national average. These findings demonstrate the advantages of therapies other than CBT. Future research is needed to replicate the equivalence between these two treatments and to explore specific patient characteristics that make one treatment more suitable and acceptable than the other.

Dynamic interpersonal therapy for moderate to severe depression: a pilot randomized controlled and feasibility trial.

BACKGROUND: Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services treat most patients in England who present to primary care with major depression. Psychodynamic psychotherapy is one of the psychotherapies offered. Dynamic Interpersonal Therapy (DIT) is a psychodynamic and mentalization-based treatment for depression. 16 sessions are delivered over approximately 5 months. Neither DIT's effectiveness relative to low-intensity treatment (LIT), nor the feasibility of randomizing patients to psychodynamic or cognitive-behavioural treatments (CBT) in an IAPT setting has been demonstrated. METHODS: 147 patients were randomized in a 3:2:1 ratio to DIT (n = 73), LIT (control intervention; n = 54) or CBT (n = 20) in four IAPT treatment services in a combined superiority and feasibility design. Patients meeting criteria for major depressive disorder were assessed at baseline, mid-treatment (3 months) and post-treatment (6 months) using the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HRSD-17), Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) and other self-rated questionnaire measures. Patients receiving DIT were also followed up 6 months post-completion. RESULTS: The DIT arm showed significantly lower HRSD-17 scores at the 6-month primary end-point compared with LIT (d = 0.70). Significantly more DIT patients (51%) showed clinically significant change on the HRSD-17 compared with LIT (9%). The DIT and CBT arms showed equivalence on most outcomes. Results were similar with the BDI-II. DIT showed benefit across a range of secondary outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: DIT delivered in a primary care setting is superior to LIT and can be appropriately compared with CBT in future RCTs.

Eight-year prospective follow-up of mentalization-based treatment versus structured clinical management for people with borderline personality disorder.

Participants (n = 134) treated in a randomized controlled trial with mentalization-based treatment (MBT) compared with structured clinical management were followed up for 8 years after starting treatment in terms of the initial primary outcome of the trial-namely, suicide attempts, self-harm, and hospitalization-as well as service use and functional outcomes. Patients in the study group were interviewed by research assistants who remained masked to the original group allocation. Interviews were scheduled annually. Of the original participants, 98 (73%) agreed to participate. Overall, the beneficial outcomes at the end of treatment were maintained in both groups. Over the follow-up period, the number of patients who continued to meet the primary recovery criteria was significantly higher in the MBT group (74% vs. 51%). Use of most other services was comparable. Participants treated with MBT showed better functional outcomes in terms of being more likely to be engaged in purposeful activity and reporting less use of professional support services and social care interventions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Drs. Constantinou and Fonagy Reply.

We thank Aristodemou and Fried1 for their thoughtful comments on our article about changes in the psychopathology bifactor dimensions over a psychosocial intervention.2 Aristodemou and Fried expressed concerns over our interpretation of the p factor and our selection of the bifactor model over alternative models. We will address each concern and highlight the issues they raise for the field more broadly.

Changes in General and Specific Psychopathology Factors Over a Psychosocial Intervention.

OBJECTIVE: Recent research suggests that comorbidity in child and adolescent psychiatric symptoms can be summarized by a single latent dimension known as the p factor and more specific factors summarizing clusters of symptoms. This study investigated within- and between-person changes in general and specific psychopathology factors over a psychosocial intervention. METHOD: A secondary analysis was conducted of the Systemic Therapy for At-Risk Teens study, a pragmatic randomized controlled trial that compared the effects of multisystemic therapy with those of management as usual for decreasing antisocial behavior in 684 adolescents (82% boys; 11-18 years old at baseline) over an 18-month period. The general p factor and specific antisocial, attention, anxiety, and mood factors were estimated from a symptom-level analysis of a set of narrowband symptom scales measured repeatedly during the study. General and specific psychopathology factors were assessed for reliability, validity, and within- and between-person change using a parallel process multilevel growth model. RESULTS: A revised bi-factor model that included a general p factor and specific anxiety, mood, antisocial, and attention factors with cross-loadings fit the data best. Although the factor structure was multidimensional, the p factor accounted for most of the variance in total scores. The p factor, anxiety, and antisocial factors predicted within-person variation in external outcomes. Furthermore, the p factor and antisocial factors showed within-person declines, whereas anxiety showed within-person increases, over time. Despite individual variation in baseline factor scores, adolescents showed similar rates of change. CONCLUSION: The bi-factor model is useful for teasing apart general and specific therapeutic changes that are conflated in standard analyses of symptom scores. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION INFORMATION: START (Systemic Therapy for At Risk Teens): A National Randomised Controlled Trial to Evaluate Multisystemic Therapy in the UK Context; http://www.isrctn.com; ISRCTN77132214.

The Effectiveness of Psychosocial Interventions for Psychological Outcomes in Pediatric Oncology: A Systematic Review.

CONTEXT: This review summarizes the current randomized controlled trials literature on psychological and physical outcomes of psychosocial interventions in pediatric oncology. OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness and impact of psychosocial interventions in children with cancer. METHODS: A search of the literature resulted in a total of 12 randomized clinical trials and these have evaluated psychosocial interventions in children younger than 18 years with current and previous diagnoses of cancer. Outcome measures were both psychological (e.g., symptoms of anxiety, depression, quality of life, and self-esteem) and physical (e.g., cancer symptoms, treatment adherence, and pain). Interventions identified included cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT; n = 4), joint CBT and physical exercise therapy (n = 1), family therapy (n = 2), therapeutic music video (n = 2), self-coping strategies (n = 1), a wish fulfillment intervention (n = 1), and joint family therapy and CBT (n = 1). RESULTS: Nine studies reported statistically significant improvements on psychological outcomes. These findings suggest that psychosocial interventions are effective at reducing anxiety and depressive symptoms as well as improving quality of life. Additionally, six studies found psychosocial interventions to have a positive impact on physical symptoms and well-being, including a reduction in procedural pain and symptom distress. CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that mental health needs in pediatric oncology patients can and should be addressed, potentially which will lead to better mental and physical health outcomes.