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Effectiveness of the Iconic Therapy for Borderline Personality Disorder Symptoms

Effectiveness of the Iconic Therapy in Youth With Suicidal Ideation/Self-injuring Behavior and Borderline Personality Traits: Study Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial

Status
Completed
Phases
NA
Study type
Interventional
Source
ClinicalTrials.gov
Registry ID
NCT03011190
Enrollment
40
Registered
2017-01-05
Start date
2015-09-30
Completion date
2017-12-31
Last updated
2018-05-15

For informational purposes only — not medical advice. Sourced from public registries and may not reflect the latest updates. Terms

Conditions

Personality Disorder, Borderline

Keywords

Terapia Iconica, BPD, adolescence, suicide

Brief summary

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is the most prevalent personality disorder in young community population whose most severe complication is suicide. Pharmacotherapy should not be used as the primary treatment for BPD as the benefits are unclear. Psychotherapy is the main treatment for people with BPD and the current recommendation is adapting available comprehensive treatments to develop easier and briefer therapies that are also effective. Iconic Therapy is an innovative option whose good clinical results should be validated on a clinical trial.

Detailed description

Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) in the early adulthood is an increasing diagnosis among general population. First symptoms detection and early intervention might help prevent its aggravation and further BPD diagnosis. Iconic Therapy is an innovative manual-driven psychotherapy to specifically and intensively treat BPD symptoms. Preliminary clinical results are good. The aim of the present study is to assess the effectiveness of the Iconic Therapy in comparison to a support structured therapy in an ecological setting (Spanish public specialized mental health care). The study is planned as a randomized controlled prospective trial that will randomize 60 young people (15 to 25 years old) with suicidal ideation/self-injuring behaviour and borderline personality traits. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of the two groups: Iconic Therapy or support structured therapy on a 1:1 basis. Both the Iconic Therapy and the support therapy programs consist of 10-12 weekly sessions delivered by two trained psychologists for about 8-12 outpatients on group format. The primary outcome measure is the change of symptoms severity assessed by the Borderline Personality Disorder List (BSL-23). Secondary outcomes include suicidal ideation and behavior, non-suicidal self-injures maladjustment to the daily life and economic evaluation for health care. Assessments will be performed at baseline after the intervention 6 and 12 months of follow-up. It is hypothesized that those attending the Iconic Therapy group will show a permanently reduction of the severity of symptoms as compared with those attending the structured support group. Data will be analyzed using generalized estimating equations (GEE) models.

Interventions

BEHAVIORALEmotional regulation

Educate people with difficulty in regulating their emotions and help them acquire skills to do so

Sponsors

Silvia Elisa Hurtado Santiago
Lead SponsorOTHER

Study design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
Masking
DOUBLE (Subject, Outcomes Assessor)

Eligibility

Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
15 Years to 25 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes

Inclusion criteria

* Aged 15-25 years old * Suicidal ideation and/or self-injuring behavior * BPD behavioural trends defined as the cut point for alarming BPD traits (\>38 score) on Exploratory Questionnaire of Personality-III-BPD (CEPER-III-BPD) * Sufficiently proficient in Spanish to follow the treatment

Exclusion criteria

* Antisocial personality disorder as measured in the Clinical Interview for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-IV Axis II) (SCID-II) * Substance or alcohol abuse * High suicidal risk * Negative expectations to be enrolled in the study as measured \< 35 by the Expectation of Treatment Scale (ETS)

Design outcomes

Primary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Change on the severity of borderline personality disorder measured by Borderline Personality Symptom List (BSL-23).Baseline and up to 12 months after inclusion.This questionnaire (BSL-23) is a dimensional instrument: the most widely used to assess borderline personality disorder symptomatology improvement in clinical trials. The Spanish validated version of the questionnaire will be used.

Secondary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Sociodemographic variablesBaselineThe following socio-demographic data will be collected: gender, age, marital status, parents´nationality, coexistence (no studies, primary studies, Secondary studies, University, Professional formation), occupation (student, working, both studying and working, pensioner) and family member or allied friend´s phone number for further contacts.
Change on the suicidal ideation and behavior measured by the Columbia Suicide History Form (SSRS).Baseline and up to 12 months after inclusion.this instrument measures ideation (wish, thinking, intention and plan), ideation severity (frequency, duration, control capacity, disuasory elements and reasons) and suicidal behavior (attempts and acts). It is considered an adequate tool for treatment planning and research.
Change on non-suicidal self-injure diagnosisBaseline and up to 12 months after inclusion.It does not exist a specific validated scale to assess non suicidal self injures so the investigators collected and asked about all the 6 Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-V) criteria. The investigators aim to separately describe the incidence of suicide attempts/acts vs non suicidal self injures in this study.
Change on the economic evaluation measured by the Client Service Receipt Inventory (CSRI) - adapted Spanish version (CSRI-Spanish version)Baseline and up to 12 months after inclusion.Questionnaire to assess use of healthcare/social care services and other economic impacts. This instrument has two subscales to assess either direct costs (emergency services/hospital admissions use, specialised medical consultations, prescribed diagnosis trials and consumed medication) or indirect costs (absenteeism and quantity/quality of job performance on a 100-point scales).

Other

MeasureTime frameDescription
Satisfaction with the treatment assessed by the Opinion of treatment scale (OTS).Through therapy completion, an average of 12 weeks.It is a quick and easy to administer 6-item scale for assessing satisfaction and rationale credibility : how believable, convincing and logical the treatment was from 0 (not at all) to 10 (very strong).
Change on the perceived subjective global improvement measured on a 7-point ad hoc Likert scaleThrough therapy completion (an average of 12 weeks) and up to 12 months after inclusionParticipants will be asked about their subjective impression : much/quite/little bit better, the same or much/quite/little bit worse compared to when they entered the study.
Change on family and friends´ perceived global improvementThrough therapy completion (an average of 12 weeks) and up to 12 months after inclusionFamily and friend´s perceived global improvement will be asked on a 7-point ad hoc Likert scale: much/quite/little bit better, the same or much/quite/little bit worse compared to when they entered the study.
Change on the maladjustment to the daily life measured by the Maladjustment Scale (EI).Baseline and up to 12 months after inclusion.It is a brief instrument of 6 self-report items assessing maladjustment to the daily life on psychiatric population. A six point Likert scale ranging from 0 (not at all) to 5 (very strong) is used. It is sensitive to therapeutic changes.

Countries

Spain

Outcome results

None listed

Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Data processed: Mar 5, 2026