Coping with unusual experiences for children study

Plain English summary of protocol

Background and study aims
The Coping with Unusual Experiences for Children Study (CUES) is an evaluation of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) for children and young people aged 8-14 years, presenting to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) with unusual experiences and emotional distress. ‘Unusual experiences’ include things like hearing voices that other people cannot hear, seeing, feeling or smelling things that other people cannot, or finding that things look somehow odd or different. These experiences are much more common than most people think and often do not cause any problems for the people experiencing them. They might even be enjoyable. However, sometimes these experiences can be upsetting or worrying to the person who has them, or can stop the person doing what they normally do. This in turn can interfere with school or work, friendships and family relationships. The CUES study is designed to find out whether a specially designed CBT package reduced distress for these young people. We know from previous studies that young people do not always talk about unusual experiences unless they are asked directly. We are therefore inviting the families of all young people referred to our local community CAMHS services to participate in the study. In the first part of the study, everybody who consents will complete a series of questionnaires about how they are feeling, how they think about things and their life experiences. Young people reporting unusual experiences and distress are then invited to take part in the second part of the study, which is the CBT evaluation. We will compare the young people taking part in the CBT straight away, with the young people taking part after a three month wait (the ‘waitlist control’ group). We predict that participants will find the intervention acceptable and will show improvements in emotional distress, compared to the waitlist control group. We also predict that they will show a reduction in the severity of their unusual experiences, and improvements in general wellbeing and day to day functioning.

Who can participate?
All young people referred to community services in the CAMHS Clinical Academic Group of the South London & Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (UK) can take part, providing their parents consent. Families whose understanding of spoken and written English is insufficient to participate without an interpreter will not be excluded, providing the clinical service is able to provide an interpreter.

What does the study involve?
For young people and their parents or caregivers, taking part in the study will involve completing questionnaires measuring how they think and feel, how they react to particular situations, and their life experiences. Young people who report unusual experiences and distress will be offered the CBT package straight away, or after a three month wait. Who joins in straightaway and who has to wait will be decided randomly, by a process a bit like tossing a coin. The CBT is delivered by a trained therapist, either straight away or after a three month wait. The young people and their parents in this part of the study will complete the questionnaires again at 3 months, and one month after the end of therapy. Therapy usually lasts for 12 weeks, with approximately weekly sessions. Sessions are arranged at time to suit the young person and their family, and we can meet in schools or other community venues if this is more convenient for them.

We will use the questionnaires to measure change in emotional distress for young people from the start of their involvement with the study (week 0) to after the first twelve weeks (week 12). We will also measure this one month after the end of therapy, to see whether any changes are lasting. We will compare young people receiving the CBT intervention with young people waiting for the intervention.

What are the possible benefits and risks of participating?
We hope that the CBT intervention will be helpful, and do not expect there to be any particular risks associated with taking part.

Where is the study run from?
The study is taking place in the CAMHS Clinical Academic Group in the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (UK), which is part of the Academic Health Sciences Centre, King’s Health Partners.

When is the study starting and how long is it expected to run for?
The study has been recruiting participants since May 2011, and aim to finish in March 2014. We aim to complete baseline assessments with 90 young people and to deliver CBT to 60 young people.

Who is funding the study?
Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity (UK)

Who is the main contact?
Dr Suzanne Jolley
Suzanne.jolley@kcl.ac.uk

Contact information

Study information

Eligibility

Locations

Countries of recruitment

• England
• United Kingdom

Study participating centre

Sponsor information

King’'s College London (UK)
Hospital/treatment centre

c/o Ms Jenny Liebscher
Governance and Delivery Manager
Institute of Psychiatry
Box P0 05
De Crespigny Park
London
SE58AF
England
United Kingdom

Phone	+44 (0)20 7848 0251
Email	jennifer.liebscher@kcl.ac.uk
Website	http://www.kcl.ac.uk/iop/research/office/about/index.aspx
"ROR"	https://ror.org/0220mzb33

Funders

Funder type

Charity

Results and Publications

Study outputs

Editorial Notes

18/01/2019: Publication reference added.
20/06/2016: No publications found, verifying study status with principal investigator.