The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

A randomised controlled trial of acceptance and commitment therapy for improving quality of life in people with muscle diseases

A randomised controlled trial of acceptance and commitment therapy for improving quality of life in people with muscle diseases
A randomised controlled trial of acceptance and commitment therapy for improving quality of life in people with muscle diseases

Background: chronic muscle diseases (MD) are progressive and cause wasting and weakness in muscles and are associated with reduced quality of life (QoL). The ACTMuS trial examined whether Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) as an adjunct to usual care improved QoL for such patients as compared to usual care alone. 

Methods: this two-arm, randomised, multicentre, parallel design recruited 155 patients with MD (Hospital and Depression Scale ≥ 8 for depression or ≥ 8 for anxiety and Montreal Cognitive Assessment ≥ 21/30). Participants were randomised, using random block sizes, to one of two groups: standard medical care (SMC) (n = 78) or to ACT in addition to SMC (n = 77), and were followed up to 9 weeks. The primary outcome was QoL, assessed by the Individualised Neuromuscular Quality of Life Questionnaire (INQoL), the average of five subscales, at 9-weeks. Trial registration was NCT02810028. 

Results: 138 people (89.0%) were followed up at 9-weeks. At all three time points, the adjusted group difference favoured the intervention group and was significant with moderate to large effect sizes. Secondary outcomes (mood, functional impairment, aspects of psychological flexibility) also showed significant differences between groups at week 9. 

Conclusions: ACT in addition to usual care was effective in improving QoL and other psychological and social outcomes in patients with MD. A 6 month follow up will determine the extent to which gains are maintained.

acceptance and commitment therapy, Muscle diseases, quality of life, randomised controlled trial
0033-2917
Rose, Michael
299ca516-ecfc-4e5c-bbfe-ebde4a1b5316
Graham, Christopher D.
56ab9898-c952-4c6a-83ef-b975ba61bed3
O'Connell, Nicola
050a69be-5bb8-44ad-bcef-8a9effab3e75
Vari, Chiara
fa6b6fb2-d0ef-4f71-9f42-b67c1752105f
Edwards, Victoria
1335939f-b90a-4374-8930-3c797e991bc0
Taylor, Emma
72b83d3b-b584-4226-b97e-e5f79162a5df
McCracken, Lance M.
74d60243-8025-4ac5-8c7b-b93bf8a87089
Radunovic, Aleksander
dfb034c5-3e74-45f9-8620-8422883ab0ca
Rakowicz, Wojtek
0d8d470a-4b66-4b72-b11b-f3407fe08aaf
Norton, Sam
e6b46b72-037d-4225-a71f-119973d37a23
Chalder, Trudie
cb09653b-2c1e-4dfc-bb13-c6e8ca918602
Rose, Michael
299ca516-ecfc-4e5c-bbfe-ebde4a1b5316
Graham, Christopher D.
56ab9898-c952-4c6a-83ef-b975ba61bed3
O'Connell, Nicola
050a69be-5bb8-44ad-bcef-8a9effab3e75
Vari, Chiara
fa6b6fb2-d0ef-4f71-9f42-b67c1752105f
Edwards, Victoria
1335939f-b90a-4374-8930-3c797e991bc0
Taylor, Emma
72b83d3b-b584-4226-b97e-e5f79162a5df
McCracken, Lance M.
74d60243-8025-4ac5-8c7b-b93bf8a87089
Radunovic, Aleksander
dfb034c5-3e74-45f9-8620-8422883ab0ca
Rakowicz, Wojtek
0d8d470a-4b66-4b72-b11b-f3407fe08aaf
Norton, Sam
e6b46b72-037d-4225-a71f-119973d37a23
Chalder, Trudie
cb09653b-2c1e-4dfc-bb13-c6e8ca918602

Rose, Michael, Graham, Christopher D., O'Connell, Nicola, Vari, Chiara, Edwards, Victoria, Taylor, Emma, McCracken, Lance M., Radunovic, Aleksander, Rakowicz, Wojtek, Norton, Sam and Chalder, Trudie (2022) A randomised controlled trial of acceptance and commitment therapy for improving quality of life in people with muscle diseases. Psychological Medicine. (doi:10.1017/S0033291722000083).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Background: chronic muscle diseases (MD) are progressive and cause wasting and weakness in muscles and are associated with reduced quality of life (QoL). The ACTMuS trial examined whether Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) as an adjunct to usual care improved QoL for such patients as compared to usual care alone. 

Methods: this two-arm, randomised, multicentre, parallel design recruited 155 patients with MD (Hospital and Depression Scale ≥ 8 for depression or ≥ 8 for anxiety and Montreal Cognitive Assessment ≥ 21/30). Participants were randomised, using random block sizes, to one of two groups: standard medical care (SMC) (n = 78) or to ACT in addition to SMC (n = 77), and were followed up to 9 weeks. The primary outcome was QoL, assessed by the Individualised Neuromuscular Quality of Life Questionnaire (INQoL), the average of five subscales, at 9-weeks. Trial registration was NCT02810028. 

Results: 138 people (89.0%) were followed up at 9-weeks. At all three time points, the adjusted group difference favoured the intervention group and was significant with moderate to large effect sizes. Secondary outcomes (mood, functional impairment, aspects of psychological flexibility) also showed significant differences between groups at week 9. 

Conclusions: ACT in addition to usual care was effective in improving QoL and other psychological and social outcomes in patients with MD. A 6 month follow up will determine the extent to which gains are maintained.

Text
a-randomised-controlled-trial-of-acceptance-and-commitment-therapy-for-improving-quality-of-life-in-people-with-muscle-diseases - Version of Record
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution.
Download (629kB)

More information

Accepted/In Press date: 6 January 2022
e-pub ahead of print date: 23 February 2022
Additional Information: Funding Information: Trudie Chalder acknowledges the financial support of the Department of Health via the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Specialist Biomedical Research Centre for Mental Health award to the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (SLaM) and the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London. The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. Michael Rose, Christopher D. Graham, Nicola O'Connell, Chiara Vari, Victoria Edwards, Emma Taylor, Lance M. McCracken, Aleksander Radunovic, Wojtek Rakowicz, and Sam Norton have no financial disclosures to make. Funding Information: This study was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Research for Patient Benefit grant (reference no. PB-PG-061331085). Muscular Dystrophy UK have been partners from the commencement of the study, funded the trial therapist and aided patient recruitment. The funders had no role in the data analysis or writing of this paper. We thank all study participants for their time and acknowledge support by the staff at all referral sites. We thank the following members of the Trial Steering Committee (TSC) and Data Safety Monitoring Ethics Committee (DSMEC); David Hilton-Jones (chair), Richard Orrell, Wojtek Rakowicz*, Ross White, Bill Love (PPI representative), Keith Sullivan (*demitted from TSC and DSMEC to be trial recruitment centre). We are grateful to Daniel Thomas (PPI representative) and MD-UK representatives for their support throughout this trial. We would like to thank the UK FSHD Patient Registry for their role in patient recruitment. We would like to thank our physiotherapy collaborators (Joanna Reffin, Emily Jay, Sunitha Narayan, Jade Donnelly, Maddie Formoy, Leslie Richards and Kelly Orr), and Kimberley Allen-Philbey, clinical trials practitioner RLH.
Keywords: acceptance and commitment therapy, Muscle diseases, quality of life, randomised controlled trial

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 456603
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/456603
ISSN: 0033-2917
PURE UUID: 7296554c-f3ec-4056-bbcd-4207a094ff2b

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 05 May 2022 16:49
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 13:00

Export record

Altmetrics

Contributors

Author: Michael Rose
Author: Christopher D. Graham
Author: Nicola O'Connell
Author: Chiara Vari
Author: Victoria Edwards
Author: Emma Taylor
Author: Lance M. McCracken
Author: Aleksander Radunovic
Author: Wojtek Rakowicz
Author: Sam Norton
Author: Trudie Chalder

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×