Study 3: Treatment Study for Older Male Veterans with PTSD
This page summarizes a treatment opportunity designed to reduce symptoms of PTSD in men aged 60 or older. The Q&A below can help you better understand the study.
What's the purpose of this study?
The purpose of this research study is to learn more about PTSD. We hope to find out more about established treatments for treating PTSD in veterans, especially those aged 60 and older.
What happens if I participate?
If you are interested, you will be called to determine if you are eligible to come in for assessments. The assessments consist of an interview and cognitive testing and will determine if you are eligible for the study.
If eligible, you will then receive weekly therapy for 12 weeks, and you will be assessed again 2 weeks following your final session and then again every 6 months until March 2013. You will receive $40 for completing each of the assessments ($120, plus $40 for each follow-up).
What are the treatments?
The treatment involves 12 sessions (90-minute weekly meetings). In the sessions, you will be randomly assigned (like flipping a coin) to one of two treatments: (1) Relaxation Training or (2) Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE). We will take time at the beginning of treatment to discuss PTSD and the rationale for the therapy. The treatments have worked well for many people, and this study will help to show which treatment works best for older male veterans. For more detailed explanations for Relaxation Training and PE see the questions below.
What is Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE)?
PE helps you decrease distress about your trauma by helping you approach trauma-related thoughts, feelings, and situations that you have been avoiding due to the short-term distress they cause. Repeated exposure to these thoughts, feelings, and situations helps reduce the power they have to cause distress.
PE has four main parts:
1. Education: allows you to learn more about your symptoms and
understand the goals of the treatment.
2. Breathing: learn how to control your breathing in order to manage immediate distress in the short-term.
3. Real world practice:
- Practice approaching situations that are safe but which you may have been avoiding because they are related to the trauma
- Example: a veteran who avoids driving since he experienced a roadside bomb while deployed may gradually begin driving again
- This type of exposure practice helps your trauma-related distress lessen over time
4. Talking through the trauma: helps you make sense of what happened and have fewer negative thoughts about the trauma.
To learn more about Prolonged Exposure therapy, click here to visit the National Center for PTSD.
What is Relaxation Training?
Relaxation training is a type of therapy where you work one-on-one with a therapist to learn different relaxation skills so that you can manage PTSD symptoms. You will learn muscle relaxation exercises and breathing techniques. Furthermore, your therapist will give you a voice recorder with different relaxation exercises for you to practice between sessions.
What's in it for me?
- $120 for completing all assessments
- You will receive information about your symptoms
- You will receive one of the treatments (randomly assigned) at no cost to you
- You may experience relief of your symptoms
- The result of the study may add to our knowledge about treating veterans who have PTSD
What if it's not helping?
Participation is voluntary. You can quit at any time, and this will not affect the medical care you were receive before beginning the study.
Will I receive any medication?
You will not receive medication as part of this study. However, your health care provider may prescribe medication if he or she thinks it would help you.
How can I get more information?
For more information about the PTSD study, please call Mark West at 619-680-1750.
What's the purpose of this study?
The purpose of this research study is to learn more about PTSD. We hope to find out more about established treatments for treating PTSD in veterans, especially those aged 60 and older.
What happens if I participate?
If you are interested, you will be called to determine if you are eligible to come in for assessments. The assessments consist of an interview and cognitive testing and will determine if you are eligible for the study.
If eligible, you will then receive weekly therapy for 12 weeks, and you will be assessed again 2 weeks following your final session and then again every 6 months until March 2013. You will receive $40 for completing each of the assessments ($120, plus $40 for each follow-up).
What are the treatments?
The treatment involves 12 sessions (90-minute weekly meetings). In the sessions, you will be randomly assigned (like flipping a coin) to one of two treatments: (1) Relaxation Training or (2) Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE). We will take time at the beginning of treatment to discuss PTSD and the rationale for the therapy. The treatments have worked well for many people, and this study will help to show which treatment works best for older male veterans. For more detailed explanations for Relaxation Training and PE see the questions below.
What is Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE)?
PE helps you decrease distress about your trauma by helping you approach trauma-related thoughts, feelings, and situations that you have been avoiding due to the short-term distress they cause. Repeated exposure to these thoughts, feelings, and situations helps reduce the power they have to cause distress.
PE has four main parts:
1. Education: allows you to learn more about your symptoms and
understand the goals of the treatment.
2. Breathing: learn how to control your breathing in order to manage immediate distress in the short-term.
3. Real world practice:
- Practice approaching situations that are safe but which you may have been avoiding because they are related to the trauma
- Example: a veteran who avoids driving since he experienced a roadside bomb while deployed may gradually begin driving again
- This type of exposure practice helps your trauma-related distress lessen over time
4. Talking through the trauma: helps you make sense of what happened and have fewer negative thoughts about the trauma.
To learn more about Prolonged Exposure therapy, click here to visit the National Center for PTSD.
What is Relaxation Training?
Relaxation training is a type of therapy where you work one-on-one with a therapist to learn different relaxation skills so that you can manage PTSD symptoms. You will learn muscle relaxation exercises and breathing techniques. Furthermore, your therapist will give you a voice recorder with different relaxation exercises for you to practice between sessions.
What's in it for me?
- $120 for completing all assessments
- You will receive information about your symptoms
- You will receive one of the treatments (randomly assigned) at no cost to you
- You may experience relief of your symptoms
- The result of the study may add to our knowledge about treating veterans who have PTSD
What if it's not helping?
Participation is voluntary. You can quit at any time, and this will not affect the medical care you were receive before beginning the study.
Will I receive any medication?
You will not receive medication as part of this study. However, your health care provider may prescribe medication if he or she thinks it would help you.
How can I get more information?
For more information about the PTSD study, please call Mark West at 619-680-1750.
