ATTEND: Adolescents and carers using MAC To END depression
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A mindfulness-based approach for adolescent non-responders to first-line treatments of depression and their carers: establishing feasibility of implementation and delivery
IRAS ID
285257
Contact name
Tamsin Ford
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cambridge and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust and University of Cambridge
ISRCTN Number
ISRCTN17823155
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 11 months, 30 days
Research summary
Depression in teenagers can knock normal development off course and disrupt family relationships. Even after treatment, many young people still have symptoms, so we need more treatment options for this group. We have developed a new treatment, ‘Mindfulness for Adolescents and Carers’ (MAC), in which young people and carers learn to recognise unhelpful patterns of thoughts and feelings and to find new ways of dealing with distress. Earlier work shows that carers and young people were willing to take part in treatment sessions. They found mindfulness helpful and young people’s symptoms reduced.
Before we can test whether MAC works and is value for money, we need to answer four questions:
Who should be trained to deliver mindfulness, and how should they be trained?
What does ‘usual’ treatment look like for this group of young people? This will help us understand how people in this group are currently treated by CAMHS so we can make sure that we target those young people most likely to benefit from mindfulness and plan a larger trial that has the most appropriate comparison treatment.
How can young people and their carers best be recruited to a study on mindfulness? We will run one mindfulness group in London and one in Devon. Young people and carers will be selected at random to either receive mindfulness or not.
Will people be willing in principle to provide blood and saliva samples to help us understand who is most likely to respond to MAC treatment? However, we are not going to take these samples in this study.
We will use what we have learned to plan a future programme of work that will definitively test whether MAC works, is value for money, whom might it work best for and how best can we identify, train and support clinicians to deliver MAC.
REC name
East of England - Cambridge South Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
20/EE/0246
Date of REC Opinion
9 Dec 2020
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion