Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy Intervention to Treat Depression in Individuals With a Traumatic Brain Injury

A Multi-site, Randomized, Controlled Trial of a Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy Intervention for Treating Depression in a Traumatic Brain Injury Population.

The purpose of this study is to determine whether mindfulness-based cognitive therapy is effective in reducing depression symptoms in individuals who have experienced a traumatic brain injury.

The investigators hypothesize that participants who are given the ten-week intervention will have fewer depression symptoms than the participants in the control group, and this improvement will be maintained at the three-month follow-up assessment.

Major depression is a significant chronic problem for people with traumatic brain injury (TBI), and its treatment is difficult. A promising approach to treat depression is mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), a relatively new therapeutic approach rooted in mindfulness-based stress-reduction (MBSR) and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). This multi-site, randomized, controlled trial of a MBCT intervention will examine the value of this intervention in improving quality of life and decreasing depression in people with TBI. MBCT may represent a time-limited, cost-effective group intervention through which clinicians would have an opportunity to address some of the most debilitating aspects of TBI.

Inclusion Criteria:

• traumatic brain injury suffered more than one year ago but less than five
• Evidence of depression post-traumatic brain injury (Beck Depression Inventory-II score of 16 or greater)
• Ability to speak and read English
• Age 18 or more

Exclusion Criteria:

• Inability to benefit from the intervention based a consensus process amongst study clinical psychologist and physicians, and from scores on memory and auditory attention (California Verbal Learning Test, Digit Span subsection of Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale); verbal fluency and executive functioning (Controlled Oral Word Association Test); verbal abstract reasoning (Similarities subsection of Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale); and executive functioning (Trail Making Test).
• Evidence of unusual psychological processes such as psychosis, suicidal ideation, substance abuse, or major concurrent mental illness (Beck Depression Inventory-II and Symptom Checklist-90-R will supplement the decision-making process of study clinicians).