Exposure/ritual prevention therapy boosts antidepressant treatment of OCD

Exposure/formulary of worship prevention therapy boosts antidepressant treatment of OCD

NIMH grantees receive demonstrated that a form of behavioral therapy be able to augment antidepressant treatment of obsessive compulsive jumble (OCD) better than an antipsychotic. The researchers make acceptable that this specific form of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) - exposure and ritual obstruction - be offered to OCD patients who slip on't respond adequately to treatment with an antidepressant alone, which is frequently the case. Current guidelines favor increase with antipsychotics.

In the controlled grief with 100 antidepressant-refractory OCD patients, 80 percent of those who accepted CBT responded, compared to 23 percent of those who received the antipsychotic risperidone, and 15 percent of those who received placebo pills. Forty-three percent practised symptoms reduced to a minimal aim following CBT treatment, compared to 13 percent the sake of risperidone and 5 percent for placebo.

The study, published September 11, 2013 in JAMA Psychiatry, was led dint of Helen Blair Simpson, M.D., of Columbia University, in New York City; and Edna Foa, Ph.D., of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

In some accompanying editorial, grantees Kerry Ressler, M.D., and Barbara Rothbaum, Ph.D., of Emory University, Atlanta, billet that antidepressants are effective in treating no other than a subset of OCD patients. They aggregate that the targeted form of CBT works via different mechanisms • such as retraining the brain's manner-forming circuitry to unlearn compulsive rituals.

Matthew Rudorfer, M.D., master of the NIMH Somatic Treatments Program, that funded the study, said that in demonstrating in what manner different patients respond best to diverging approaches, it helps to move the scope toward the goal of more personalized method of treating.