ABSTRACT
Background: Psychotherapy treatment specificity is the degree to which therapists utilize specific factors and not others of an intended treatment during therapy sessions. In Interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT), increased specificity has been associated with greater efficacy. IPT, however, is a dyadic intervention, and little is known about the relationship between patients pre-treatment characteristics and IPT specificity. Understanding patient characteristics that predict treatment specificity is crucial for treatment optimization.
Methods: Subjects meeting DSM-IV criteria for Major Depressive Disorder were randomly assigned to IPT or escitalopram. Data from a small sub-set of subjects were examined: 20 patients (8 males, 12 females), randomized to receive IPT from one of four study therapists. Subjects remitted with IPT alone. The following predictors were hypothesized to be associated with higher treatment specificity: a) treatment preference match (patients indicating a preference for psychotherapy) as opposed to non-match (patients indicating a preference for medication or no preference); b) lower baseline scores on anxiety spectrum assessments; and, c) higher severity baseline depression scores. Patient/ therapist gender match (female patient matched with female therapist) in comparison to non-gender match (male patient with female therapist) were predicted to produce negligible results.
Results: Higher baseline depressive severity predicted higher IPT specificity. Higher baseline depressive severity and preference for no therapy were highly correlated. However, patient treatment preference, therapist/ patient gender match, and anxiety spectrum scores were not related to treatment specificity.
Implications: Results suggest that specificity may act as mediator between baseline depressive severity and outcome. Further studies with larger samples are needed.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-04242009-135240 |
| Date | 18 May 2009 |
| Creators | Bailey, Bridget Catherine |
| Contributors | Dr. Catherine Greeno, Dr. Holly Swartz, Dr. Ellen Frank, Dr. Nancy Grote, Dr. Hellen Petracchi |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-04242009-135240/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
Page generated in 0.0013 seconds