ATTEND Adolescents and carers using mindfulnessTherapy ToENDdepression
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Is Mindfulness for Adolescents and Carers (MAC) plus treatment as usual (TAU) more effective and cost-effective compared to TAU alone; how does it work and for whom does it work best? A Randomised Controlled Trial (RCT) with embedded economic evaluation and study of mechanisms.
IRAS ID
341587
Contact name
Tamsin Ford
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cambridge and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 3 months, 30 days
Research summary
Suffering from depression or anxiety as a teenager is hard and can have a big impact on social and family relationships, and on education and employment. Teenagers who still have symptoms after usual or currently available treatment for depression or anxiety, or who relapse, need more treatment options.
We have developed a new treatment, Mindfulness for Adolescents and Carers (MAC). MAC is a Mindfulness-based Cognitive-Therapy teaching young people skills to help them recognise and respond to early warning signs of depression or anxiety. We want to see if MAC can support 15–18-year-olds who have recurrent depression or anxiety to recover and stay well for longer.
Depression or anxiety often runs in families, so we are asking parents/carers to take part as well, to see if taking part in MAC can be helpful for parents’/carer’s own mental health as well as supporting their child’s.
MAC treatment sessions are group-based (either in-person or online), weekly for 8 weeks. We don’t know if MAC is better than the current treatments available. Therefore, to compare them, the young person will either be assigned to:
Group 1: will take part in a MAC group, while continuing with their current treatment, OR
Group 2: will continue with their current treatment and not take part in a MAC group.Parents/carers of those assigned to Group 1 are invited to attend sessions with other parents/carers, to work through similar materials.
All young people and parents/carers will be asked to fill out some questionnaires online for 12 months, to measure any changes in how they think and feel. This will help us compare MAC’s effects to the current treatments available.
We are recruiting from East of England, London, Devon, Sussex, Nottingham, Oxford. It is funded by the NIHR. To find out more please visit https://dev.psychiatry.cam.ac.uk/attend
REC name
East of England - Cambridge South Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
24/EE/0091
Date of REC Opinion
23 May 2024
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion