A
Mahdi Rahmani; mohsen jalali; elnaz pourahmadi; Abdolsamad nikan
Abstract
Objective: Patients with Ménière's disease often report experiencing various psychological challenges, including heightened levels of anxiety, depression, and stress. Despite these concerns, research addressing the treatment of psychological aspects in Ménière's disease remains ...
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Objective: Patients with Ménière's disease often report experiencing various psychological challenges, including heightened levels of anxiety, depression, and stress. Despite these concerns, research addressing the treatment of psychological aspects in Ménière's disease remains limited. Individuals living with this condition face substantial difficulties, compounded by the absence of a definitive cure. A review of the literature, both within and outside Iran, highlights a scarcity of evidence supporting the efficacy of psychological interventions for this population. Furthermore, existing studies provide mixed findings regarding the effectiveness of schema therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) in alleviating anxiety, depression, and stress among these patients. This study aimed to address this gap by comparing the efficacy of schema therapy and CBT in reducing psychological symptoms in patients with Ménière's disease. Method: This quasi-experimental study employed a pre-test, post-test, and follow-up design to evaluate the interventions. The statistical population comprised patients diagnosed with Ménière's disease who exhibited comorbid depression and anxiety. From this population, 45 patients were selected using purposive sampling and assigned to three groups: schema therapy, CBT, and a control group. Participants were randomly distributed among these groups, with 15 patients in each. Inclusion and exclusion criteria ensured the selection of participants suitable for the study. The schema therapy group underwent intervention facilitated by the researcher in ten weekly group sessions, each lasting two hours over a 2.5-month period. The CBT group also participated in ten weekly two-hour sessions, administered by a therapist specializing in CBT. The control group received no therapeutic intervention but participated in the pre-test, post-test, and follow-up assessments. Psychological outcomes were measured at baseline, immediately following the intervention, and one month post-intervention using the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale (DASS). Data were analyzed using repeated mesure variacnes. Results: The results revealed significant reductions in depression, anxiety, and stress among patients in both schema therapy and CBT groups compared to the control group at post-test and follow-up (P < 0.05). Notably, schema therapy demonstrated significantly greater efficacy than CBT in reducing depression (P < 0.05), while no significant differences were observed between the two therapies for anxiety and stress reduction (P > 0.05). These findings indicate that schema therapy was particularly effective in mitigating depressive symptoms during the follow-up phase, whereas both therapies were equally beneficial in addressing anxiety and stress relative to the control condition. Conclusion: This study underscores the effectiveness of schema therapy and CBT in alleviating psychological symptoms in patients with Ménière's disease. The findings suggest that these interventions may serve as valuable therapeutic approaches for improving the mental health of this population. Schema therapy, in particular, appears to offer superior benefits in reducing depressive symptoms. However, several limitations should acknowledged. The study's relatively small sample size and the geographic dispersion of participants posed logistical challenges. Additionally, the researcher’s dual role as therapist for the schema therapy group may have introduced bias, potentially impac the double-blind rigor of the study. Future research with larger, more diverse samples and independent therapists recommended to validate findings and refine treatment strategies
A
mohsen jalali; elnaz pourahmadi
Abstract
Objectives: During the pandemic COVID-19, numerous studies displayed an increase in anxiety and depression in pregnant women. This present study aimed to investigate the effect of neurofeedback therapy on pregnancy anxiety and prenatal depression in pregnant women. Methods: The study was a single-case ...
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Objectives: During the pandemic COVID-19, numerous studies displayed an increase in anxiety and depression in pregnant women. This present study aimed to investigate the effect of neurofeedback therapy on pregnancy anxiety and prenatal depression in pregnant women. Methods: The study was a single-case experimental study with multiple baseline design with a follow-up period. Three pregnant women were selected according to purposive sampling method and entered the study gradually in fixed intervals. The research tools included the neurofeedback therapy, Pregnancy Related Anxiety Questionnaire (PRAQ) and Beck Depression Inventory Second Edition (BDI-II). Results: The findings showed that the neurofeedback reduced the severity of pregnancy anxiety and prenatal depression symptoms in both post-treatment and follow-up stages, so that the percentage of improvement for the first, second and third participants in the symptoms of pregnancy anxiety was 72%, 74% and 71% in post-treatment and 75%, 80% and 73% in follow-up stage, respectively. The percentages of improvement for the first, second and third participants in the symptoms of prenatal depression were also 72%, 77% and 77% in post-treatment and 79%, 77% and 83% in follow-up stages, respectively. Moreover, the overall percentages of improvement in post-treatment and follow-up stage in the symptoms of pregnancy anxiety were 72% and 79% and in the symptoms of prenatal depression was 75% and 80%, respectively. In addition, at the end of the intervention sessions and at the 1-month follow-up, all the three patients scored less than 14 on BDI-II, which indicated the clinical significance of the reduction of their depression symptoms on this scale. The visual analyses and the results of inter-positional and intra-positional analyses showed a significant difference between baseline and intervention stage for all subjects (PND>70, PAND>50). The percentages of non-overlapping data (PND) as a measure of effect size for the first, second and third participants in the symptoms of pregnancy anxiety were 83%, 100% and 83% respectively. The percentages of all non-overlapping data (PAND) as the second effect size criterion for the subjects were also 87.5%, 100% and 90%, respectively, which shows the effectiveness of the intervention for all the three subjects in the symptoms of pregnancy anxiety. The percentages of non-overlapping data (PND) for the first, second and third participants in the symptoms of prenatal depression were 83%, 83% and 67% respectively. The percentages of all non-overlapping data (PAND) for the subjects were 87.5%, 89% and 800% respectively, which shows the effectiveness of the intervention for all the three subjects in the symptoms of prenatal depression.
