Coherence Training for Military Personnel

Not Applicable

Completed

• Conditions: Stress
• Interventions: Behavioral: Progressive Muscle Relaxation; Behavioral: Coherence Advantage

• Registration Number: NCT01599598
• Lead Sponsor: United States Naval Medical Center, San Diego

Brief Summary

Military operations and training situations present many physical and psychological challenges for service members to adapt to and overcome. The challenges of these changing conditions necessitate having to cope with stress, which is seen as the negative perceptions, feelings, and emotions that manifest from the subjective physical and/or mental strain on life processes. In addition, service members are returning from deployments having gone through traumatic experiences that can develop into posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression or other serious conditions. The Surface Warfare Independent Duty Corpsman (IDC) School is an example of a training environment where some students may be entering the program with symptoms of PTSD, which may preclude or make it more difficult for them to perform well. Autonomic nervous system (ANS) dysregulation has been observed in patients with PTSD and those experiencing chronic stress, such that there is more arousing, sympathetic input to the heart than calming, parasympathetic input, which is usually the dominant division of the ANS involved in controlling one's heart rate. The IDC training program is an example of an environment where the service member is expected to excel while being subjected to multiple sources of stress. The fast tempo coupled with performance expectations may induce stress and actually inhibit learning. The Institute of HeartMath has developed the Coherence Advantage program which teaches one to self-regulate their emotions while focusing on breathing to compliment the active process of self-regulation. In conjunction, the emWave Personal Stress Reliever allows the user to receive heart rate variability (HRV) biofeedback, hence giving the user the opportunity to self-regulate their ANS through breathing and self-regulation techniques. The proposed study will test the effectiveness of the Coherence Advantage program versus progressive muscle relaxation (PMR) in reducing stress symptomatology among Surface Warfare IDC students. The effectiveness of these two different interventions will be compared on outcomes of PTSD, depression, anxiety, sleep quality, perceived stress, attrition, and class performance.

Detailed Description

Not available

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2012-04
• Study First Submitted: 2012-05-07
• Study First Submitted QC: 2012-05-14
• Study First Posted: 2012-05-16
• Primary Completion: 2014-09
• Study Completion: 2014-09
• Status Verified: 2016-08
• Last Update Submitted: 2016-08-17
• Last Update Posted: 2016-08-19

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 192

Inclusion Criteria

• Sailors
• Enrolled as students in the Surface Warfare Medicine Institute's Independent Duty Corpsman School

Exclusion Criteria

• Administratively rolled over into another class
• Dropped out of the school (due to academic or medical reasons)

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Progressive Muscle Relaxation	Progressive Muscle Relaxation	A stress intervention where subjects will learn to regulate stress based on the tensing and releasing of the major muscle groups in the body, accompanied with relaxed breathing techniques.
Coherence Advantage	Coherence Advantage	A stress intervention where subjects will learn to regulate stress by focusing on breathing and mindfulness techniques while recognizing physiological coherence by way of a portable biofeedback device.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Stress symptomatology	12 months	The effectiveness of the two stress intervention trainings will be evaluated on symptoms of depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, generalized anxiety, perceived stress, and sleep quality.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
School performance	12 months	The effectiveness of the two stress intervention trainings will be evaluated on final grades.
Attrition	12 months	The effectiveness of the two stress intervention trainings will be evaluated on rates of attrition.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Surface Warfare Medicine Institute; 🇺🇸 San Diego, California, United States