Adaptive Disclosure: A Combat-Specific PTSD Treatment
Abstract
Many troops return from deployment with mental health problems related to their experiences. One such problem is posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which involves symptoms such as persistent unwanted memories of traumatic events, avoidance of reminders of the events, excessive watchfulness, jumpiness and irritability. Current therapies for PTSD focus chiefly on fear related to life-threat and were developed chiefly on civilians. We developed and piloted tested an early psychological treatment for PTSD designed specifically for service members who suffer not only life-threat, but traumatic loss and inner conflicts from morally injurious experiences. AD is an eight-session treatment that helps Marines to identify unhelpful beliefs about a traumatic event and find ways to move forward. Preliminary data suggests that AD is acceptable to Marines, safe and feasible to implement, and that it reduces PSTD and depression. The primary objective of this randomized controlled non-inferiority trial is to determine whether Adaptive Disclosure (AD), a new combat-specific psychotherapy for PTSD, is comparable in efficacy to Cognitive Processing Therapy, cognitive only version (CPT-C) in terms of its impact on deployment-related psychological problems (specifically PTSD and depression) and functioning. As secondary aims, we have specified some comparisons in which we believe that AD will be superior to CPT-C (degree of change in posttraumatic grief, moral injury, resilience, and posttraumatic growth, as well as degree of treatment acceptability) and we propose to evaluate a posited mechanism of change (trauma-related cognition). There are no up-to-date findings as data collection has not yet begun.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Oct 01, 2011
- Accession Number
- ADA555048
Entities
People
- Brett T Litz
Organizations
- Boston VA Research Institute