Chronic Disease
Conditions
Brief summary
Investigators are building a program that uses improvisation to teach kids and teens with medical issues healthy ways to cope. Medical issues have been linked to anxiety and depression. Doing theatre can prevent these complications. Participants will meet in groups of about ten for ten weeks to do improvisation that is fun and supportive. Participants will meet with a study team member before the program starts, after the program ends, six months after the program ends, and twelve months after the program ends. At these visits, participants will be screened for anxiety, depression, quality of life, and will be given a short interview.
Detailed description
Adolescents with chronic medical conditions are at increased risk for anxiety and depression compared to other people their age. Therapies that use role-play prevent anxiety and depression. However, often these studies do not have an underlying psychological framework, or there is not enough information to replicate the program. Investigators designed an intervention using role-play based on Integrative Community Therapy, developed in the 1980s by Dr. Adalberto Barreto. This program will help adolescents with chronic medical conditions explore their feelings about issues related to having a chronic condition, learn new coping strategies, and help one another find support among peers. This treatment will take place once a week for 10 weeks and investigators will compare the effects to those derived from improvisational theatre alone. To evaluate this new treatment, the study team will screen participants for anxiety, depression, quality of life, and will give a short qualitative interview. This will occur before and after the intervention, 6 months after the intervention, and 1 year after the intervention.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALIntervention: Integrative Community Therapy-based Psychodrama
Participants produce theatre scenes depicting issues that they have experienced. Group leaders then use a guide to facilitate a discussion of participants' feelings, coping strategies, and sharing of local knowledge.
BEHAVIORALControl: Improvisational Theatre
Participants play improvisational theatre games.
Sponsors
Geisinger Clinic
Study design
Allocation
NON_RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
SINGLE (Subject)
Masking description
The participants will not know which group they are in, as they will not be familiar with the particular procedure of the intervention being studied
Intervention model description
One group will receive a new behavioral intervention; the other group will receive improvisational theatre alone
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
5 Years to 19 Years
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* Identify as having a CMC * In grades kindergarten to 12th grade during the year recruited for the study * 5 years of age and ≤ 19 years of age at the start of the intervention * Able and willing to participate in improvisational theatre in spoken English * Able to understand and answer standard questionnaires used for evaluation in English (with or without accommodation)
Exclusion criteria
* None
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Anxiety and Depression | Baseline to 10 weeks | Anxiety and Depression as evaluated by the Revised Children's Anxiety and Depression Scale; Scored 0-30; higher score indicates worse outcome |
| Disease-Related Quality of Life | Baseline to 10 weeks | Disease-Related Quality of Life as evaluated by Qualitative Interview |
| Knowledge and Utilization of Coping Strategies | Baseline to 10 weeks | Knowledge and Utilization of Coping Strategies as evaluated by Qualitative Interview |
| Empathy | Baseline to 10 weeks | Empathy as evaluated by Qualitative Interview |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed