Effectiveness of inpatient versus outpatient complex treatment programs in depressive disorders: a quasi-experimental study under naturalistic conditions.

BACKGROUND: Due to long waiting periods for outpatient psychotherapy and the high resource requirements of inpatient treatment, there is a need for alternative treatment programs for patients with depressive disorders. Thus, we investigated the effectiveness of the "Bielefeld Outpatient Intensive Treatment Program of Depression" (BID) in comparison with a typical inpatient treatment program by using a prospective quasi-experimental observational study. We assumed (i) that both complex programs are effective in pre-post analyses after 6 weeks and (ii) that inpatient treatment is more effective compared with the outpatient program. METHODS: Four hundred patients with depressive psychopathology - a majority with depressive episodes (ICD-10 F3X) - took part in the BID and 193 in the inpatient program. Different self- (i.e., BDI) and expert measures (i.e., MADRS) of psychopathology at baseline (t1) and 6 weeks later (t2) were applied to examine treatment effects. RESULTS: Treatment effects were high in separate analyses of both groups with Cohen's d ranging from 1.10 to 1.76., while ANOVA comparative analyses did not reveal any significant differences between both treatment settings nor did a set of independent covariates analyzed here. Response rates of BDI (p = .002) and MADRS (p = .001) were higher in the outpatient group. Results indicate BID not to be inferior compared to an inpatient program, although diverging pathways to treatment, higher rates of clinical recurrent depressive disorders and severe episodes as well as lower rates of employment and partnership in the inpatient treatment group have to be considered. CONCLUSION: Outpatient intensive treatment programs may represent a solution for patients needing more than a treatment session once per week but less than a complex inpatient or day clinic program.

How is childhood emotional abuse related to major depression in adulthood? The role of personality and emotion acceptance.

Accumulated evidence provides support that childhood emotional abuse (CEA) is related to adult major depressive disorder (MDD) outcomes. However, the psychological mechanisms of this relation are still not well understood. Changes in personality and emotion regulation are indicated to play a mediating role what should be examined in this paper. A sample of 123 MDD inpatients was examined in a prospective observational study with two times of measurement. Patients provided data on childhood trauma history, personality disorder (PD) traits and emotion acceptance. Self- and expert-ratings of depressive symptoms were assessed at baseline and at the end of treatment. Treatment duration as an objective indicator of treatment outcome was additionally considered. Partial correlation analyses revealed associations between CEA and self-ratings of MDD symptom severity and symptom improvement independent of sexual and physical abuse. Expert-ratings of depression and treatment duration were not related to CEA. Mediation analyses revealed that particularly the factors borderline psychopathology as well as acceptance of pleasant emotions mediated the association of CEA and self-rated MDD symptoms. Passive-aggressive PD traits mediated the link between CEA and a lower self-rated symptom improvement. CEA affect specific personality traits and acceptance of emotions. This association may play a critical role for self-reported depressive symptoms with implications for prevention, psychoeducation, and treatment of MDD.