Cognitive and Health Benefits of Expressive Writing for Family Caregivers Under Stress - Full Text View

Sponsors and Collaborators:	University of Toronto Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care
Information provided by:	University of Toronto
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:	NCT00303147

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to determine if expressive writing is an effective intervention for reducing stress, enhancing cognition, and improving quality of life for caregivers of older adults with dementia

Condition	Intervention	Phase
Stress, Psychological Anxiety	Behavioral: Expressive Writing	Phase I

MedlinePlus related topics: Caregivers Stress

U.S. FDA Resources

Study Type:	Interventional
Study Design:	Treatment, Randomized, Open Label, Active Control, Parallel Assignment

Further study details as provided by University of Toronto:

Primary Outcome Measures:

General Health Questionnaire
Impact of Events Scale
Zarit Burden Interview (short form)
California Verbal Learning Test
Ruff 2 & 7 Selective Attention Test
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)

Estimated Enrollment:	120
Study Start Date:	May 2003
Estimated Study Completion Date:	July 2005

Detailed Description:

A significant and growing need exists to support caregivers of older adults with dementia, including methods of support that are easily implemented and targeted at caregivers who can not access multicomponent interventions. The current intervention examines the efficacy of one such approach: expressive writing (EW).

We are examining the efficacy of EW, in terms of its ability to reduce stress, enhance cognition, and improve well-being, by comparing it to two control conditions: objective writing about how caregivers spend their time (time management; TM) and objective writing about non-personal historical events (history writing; HW).

Eligibility

Ages Eligible for Study:	18 Years and older
Genders Eligible for Study:	Both
Accepts Healthy Volunteers:	Yes

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

Primary family caregiver for an older adult with dementia
Self-reported caregiver stress or burden
Fluency in written/spoken English

Exclusion Criteria:

non-family or non-primary caregiver
existing use of expressive writing / diary

Contacts and Locations

Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00303147

Locations

Canada, Ontario
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 1V6

Sponsors and Collaborators

University of Toronto

Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care

Investigators

Principal Investigator:	Corey S Mackenzie, Ph.D.	University of Toronto
Principal Investigator:	Lynn Hasher, Ph.D.	University of Toronto
Principal Investigator:	David Goldstein, Ph.D.	University of Toronto

More Information

Study ID Numbers:	11438
Study First Received:	March 14, 2006
Last Updated:	March 14, 2006
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:	NCT00303147
Health Authority:	Canada: Ethics Review Committee

Keywords provided by University of Toronto:

Expressive Writing
Written Emotional Expression
Caregiver Stress
Cognition

Study placed in the following topic categories:

Stress, Psychological
Stress
Behavioral Symptoms

Additional relevant MeSH terms:

Pathologic Processes

ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on January 16, 2009