Keep patients engaged
Preliminary results showed reductions in PCL-5 scores from pre- to posttreatment of approximately 40% (P < .001).
“Just over 50% of patients left [the program] with symptoms below probable PTSD diagnosis on a self-report measure,” Dr. Rozek said.
Importantly, none of the participants dropped out of the treatment, but Dr. Rozek said that this was not necessarily surprising because of the nature of the program.
“These patients are brought in as a cohort and form some bonds, as they all have experienced traumatic events, although often [they have had] very different traumas,” he said.
“We’ve found that by doing daily treatment, it is more accessible and removes barriers, as it is often easier to take a week or a few weeks off at a time and participate in treatment than the logistics of weekly treatment,” he added.
Dr. Rozek said he suspects two key factors may predict treatment response in such programs – cognitive flexibility and emotion regulation.
“Patients who come into treatment and are extremely rigid in their thinking and are unable to manage their emotions may be slower to respond to treatment,” he noted.
“That being said, there are a variety of treatments that target these factors in different ways. Now we need to do the work to determine which treatments work for whom.”
The findings on longer-term durability of rapid improvement bode well for the program. “Although the work in treatment is hard, they patients really start to see the gains quickly, within a week or weeks instead of months,” Dr. Rozek said.
“This is rewarding in itself, and I would say is a strong factor for keeping patients engaged,” he concluded.
Dr. Rozek has received research funding from the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense, the Bob Woodruff Foundation, and the Boeing Corporation.
A version of this article originally appeared on Medscape.com.