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Treatment for Youth (Ages 8 to 16 Years Old) With Misophonia (U-HEAR)

Unified Protocol to Help Emotions and Promote Auditory Relief (U-HEAR).

Status
UNKNOWN
Phases
NA
Study type
Interventional
Source
ClinicalTrials.gov
Registry ID
NCT04365543
Acronym
U-HEAR
Enrollment
124
Registered
2020-04-28
Start date
2020-04-08
Completion date
2022-12-31
Last updated
2020-04-28

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

Conditions

Misophonia

Keywords

misophonia, sensory sensitivity, anxiety, sound

Brief summary

If someone is really sensitive to certain noises and sounds, they might have misophonia. U-HEAR is a study created to find out what helps kids and teens with misophonia. There are two treatments being tested in this study. The treatment your child receives will be determined at random. There will be a Two-Thirds (2/3rds or 66%) chance your child will receive a treatment called the Unified Protocol for Children and Adolescents (UP-C/A) that has been modified to meet the needs for youth with misophonia. There is a One-Third (1/3rd or 33%) chance your child will receive a treatment called Psychoeducation and Relaxation. All participants will get ten free treatment sessions. Each session will last one hour and happen once a week. The aim of the study is to evaluate the feasibility and preliminary efficacy of the UP-C/A for youth with misophonia.

Detailed description

Misophonia is a condition characterized by intense affective and/or physical responses to auditory triggers. Negative affective states, including significant distress and avoidance are characteristic of misophonia. These negative emotional responses to trigger sounds, which result in behavioral problems and impairment, may be the primary targets for effective psychosocial intervention for misophonia. Transdiagnostic treatment approaches address clinically-significant distress through the use of evidence-based, cognitive-behavioral techniques (e.g., mindful awareness, problem-solving, and opposite action strategies) that allow for flexible and personalized treatment of core dysfunctions that cut across emotional disorders and lead to on-going impairment. This type of evidence-based, transdiagnostic approach includes skills applicable for problems observed frequently in misophonia including adaptability, problem solving, emotional (arousal) dysregulation and poor distress tolerance. The hypothesized mechanism of change of these core-dysfunction focused treatments is increased tolerance of distress in response to strong or intense emotion states. A secondary target is the reduction of maladaptive emotional behaviors (e.g., avoidance, aggression, escape) that may reinforce distress over time. To that end, this proposal aims to evaluate the feasibility and preliminary efficacy of the Unified Protocols for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders in Children and Adolescents (UP-C/A) for youth with misophonia. We will compare UP-C/A in a 2:1 ratio against a comparison condition (PRT: psychoeducation plus relaxation training), a behavioral approach that represents usual treatment in the community and has been utilized in clinical trials (35% response rate).

Interventions

BEHAVIORALUnified Protocols for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders in Children and Adolescents (UP-C/A) for youth with misophonia

Please see arm/group descriptions

BEHAVIORALPsychoeducation and Relaxation Therapy (PRT)

Please see arm/group descriptions

Sponsors

University of Miami
CollaboratorOTHER
University of South Florida
Lead SponsorOTHER

Study design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
DOUBLE (Investigator, Outcomes Assessor)

Eligibility

Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
8 Years to 16 Years
Healthy volunteers
No

Inclusion criteria

* The child meets criteria for misophonia * The child is currently living with their family/guardian(s) * The child is between 8 and 16 years old * Parent/legal guardian and child are able to read and speak English without a translator * Parent/legal guardian is able to attend weekly sessions and all assessments * If the child is on a psychotropic medication, they will need to be on a stable dose for 4 weeks prior to assessment (2 weeks for stimulant medication)

Exclusion criteria

* The child has received prior UP-C/A treatment * The child is acutely suicidal * The child has a current diagnosis of psychosis, bipolar disorder, intellectual disability, alcohol/substance dependence, or eating disorder

Design outcomes

Primary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Overall impairment measured by Child's Global Assessment Scale (10 weeks)10 weeksClinician rated measure of general functioning including impairment to capture functioning/impairment independent of diagnoses. The child or young person is given a single score between 1 and 100, based on a clinician's assessment of a range of aspects related to a child's psychological and social functioning. The score will put them in one of ten categories that range from 'extremely impaired' (1-10) to 'doing very well' (91-100). CGAS will be used to measure general functioning after 10 weeks of treatment.
Severity of symptoms measured by Clinical Global Impression - Severity (5 weeks)5 weeksClinical Global Impression-Severity (CGI-S) is a widely used 7-point clinician rating of severity of psychopathology; raters will be instructed to score based on psychopathology and misophonia symptoms. Severity ratings range from 1 (no illness) to 7 (extremely severe). CGI-S will be used to measure severity after 5 weeks of treatment.
Severity of symptoms measured by Clinical Global Impression - Severity (10 weeks)5 weeksClinical Global Impression-Severity (CGI-S) is a widely used 7-point clinician rating of severity of psychopathology; raters will be instructed to score based on psychopathology and misophonia symptoms. Severity ratings range from 1 (no illness) to 7 (extremely severe). CGI-S will be used to measure severity after 10 weeks of treatment.
Overall impairment measured by Child's Global Assessment Scale (Baseline)BaselineClinician rated measure of general functioning including impairment to capture functioning/impairment independent of diagnoses. The child or young person is given a single score between 1 and 100, based on a clinician's assessment of a range of aspects related to a child's psychological and social functioning. The score will put them in one of ten categories that range from 'extremely impaired' (1-10) to 'doing very well' (91-100. General functioning of the participant will be measured before treatment begins to create a baseline for each subject.
Overall impairment measured by Child's Global Assessment Scale (5 weeks)5 weeksClinician rated measure of general functioning including impairment to capture functioning/impairment independent of diagnoses. The child or young person is given a single score between 1 and 100, based on a clinician's assessment of a range of aspects related to a child's psychological and social functioning. The score will put them in one of ten categories that range from 'extremely impaired' (1-10) to 'doing very well' (91-100). CGAS will be used to measure general functioning after 5 weeks of treatment.
Improvement in symptoms measured by Clinical Global Impression - Improvement (5 weeks)5 weeksClinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) is a 7-point clinician rated scale of treatment response anchored by 1 (very much improved) and 7 (very much worse). For categorical secondary outcomes, response is defined as a CGI-I rating of 1 or 2 (much improved/very much improved), and remission as CGI-S of 1 to 2. CGI-I will be used to measure symptom improvement after 5 weeks of treatment.
Improvement in symptoms measured by Clinical Global Impression - Improvement (10 weeks)10 weeksClinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) is a 7-point clinician rated scale of treatment response anchored by 1 (very much improved) and 7 (very much worse). For categorical secondary outcomes, response is defined as a CGI-I rating of 1 or 2 (much improved/very much improved), and remission as CGI-S of 1 to 2. CGI-I will be used to measure symptom improvement after 10 weeks of treatment.
Severity of symptoms measured by Clinical Global Impression - Severity (Baseline)BaselineClinical Global Impression-Severity (CGI-S) is a widely used 7-point clinician rating of severity of psychopathology; raters will be instructed to score based on psychopathology and misophonia symptoms. Severity ratings range from 1 (no illness) to 7 (extremely severe). Severity will be measured before treatment begins to create a baseline for each participant.

Secondary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Change in misophonia symptoms as measured by Misophonia Assessment Questionnaire5 weeksMisophonia Assessment Questionnaire (MAQ) is a 21 item, youth self-report, and parent-report questionnaire assessing severity and side effects of the youth's misophonia symptoms and reactions to misophonic sounds.
Misophonia symptoms as measured by Misophonia QuestionnaireBaselineThe Misophonia Questionnaire is a 17-item questionnaire that assesses the presence of misophonia symptoms, emotions and behaviors associated with misophonic reactions, and symptom severity. The first two subscales are rated on a scale of 0 (not at all true) to 4 (always true). These two parts are summed to produce a total score ranging from 0 - 68. The severity subscale is a single item that asks an individual to provide a rating of their sound sensitivity on a scale from 0 (no sound sensitivities) to 15 (very severe sound sensitivities). The youth self-report (for those 10 and older) and parent report will serve as both a measure of symptoms of misophonia and allow for calculation of severity score.
Change in misophonia symptoms as measured by Misophonia Questionnaire5 weeksThe Misophonia Questionnaire is a 17-item questionnaire that assesses the presence of misophonia symptoms, emotions and behaviors associated with misophonic reactions, and symptom severity. The first two subscales are rated on a scale of 0 (not at all true) to 4 (always true). These two parts are summed to produce a total score ranging from 0 - 68. The severity subscale is a single item that asks an individual to provide a rating of their sound sensitivity on a scale from 0 (no sound sensitivities) to 15 (very severe sound sensitivities). The youth self-report (for those 10 and older) and parent report will serve as both a measure of symptoms of misophonia and allow for calculation of severity score.
Misophonia symptoms as measured by Misophonia Assessment QuestionnaireBaselineMisophonia Assessment Questionnaire (MAQ) is a 21 item, youth self-report, and parent-report questionnaire assessing severity and side effects of the youth's misophonia symptoms and reactions to misophonic sounds.

Countries

United States

Contacts

Primary ContactKelly Kudryk, BA
kellykudryk@miami.edu813-586-1630
Backup ContactJane Mutch, PhD
rothmanctr@usf.edu727-767-8230

Outcome results

None listed

Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Data processed: Feb 4, 2026