Internet-based Self-help After Spousal Bereavement or Divorce

Not Applicable

Completed

• Conditions: Prolonged Grief Symptoms
• Interventions: Other: Internet-based self-help

• Registration Number: NCT02900534
• Lead Sponsor: University of Bern

Brief Summary

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of an internet-based self-help intervention for older adults with prolonged grief symptoms after spousal bereavement or separation/divorce. The study design is a randomized trial with a waiting control condition of 12 weeks and a follow-up after 6 months. The investigators will test the following main hypotheses:

1. The intervention group shows a significant decrease in grief symptoms, psychological distress, depression symptoms and embitterment, and a significant increase in life satisfaction, as well as session related outcomes from baseline to 12 weeks post intervention assessment.

2. The effects in the intervention group are larger than the effects in the waiting control group.

3. These effects are stable from the post measure at 12 weeks to the 6-month follow-up.

Detailed Description

Not available

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2016-05
• Study First Submitted: 2016-09-01
• Study First Submitted QC: 2016-09-08
• Study First Posted: 2016-09-14
• Primary Completion: 2018-05-06
• Study Completion: 2018-05-06
• Status Verified: 2018-10
• Last Update Submitted: 2018-10-19
• Last Update Posted: 2018-10-22

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 110

Inclusion Criteria

• Marital bereavement or separation/divorce. Both events should have happened more than 6 months before participating in the study.
• Seeking support for coping with grief symptoms
• Internet access
• Mastery of the German language
• Informed Consent

Exclusion Criteria

• Acute suicidality (BDI Suicide item > 1 or suicidal ideation in the telephone interview)
• No emergency plan: In the telephone interview, an emergency plan will be developed which specifies a health care professional, who participants can turn to in an acute crisis. If no such person or health care service can be found, individuals will be excluded from the intervention.
• Severe psychological or somatic disorders which need immediate treatment.
• Concomitant psychotherapy (participants may take part in the self-help intervention, but will not be included in the study.)
• Prescribed drugs against depression or anxiety lead to an exclusion if prescription or dosage has changed in the month prior or during the self-help intervention.
• Inability to follow the procedures of the study, e.g. due to comprehension problems

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Internet-based self-help	Internet-based self-help	The self-help programme consists of 10 text-based sessions and one supportive E-Mail a week. The programme employs cognitive-behavioural interventions. The theoretical background is the Dual Process Model by Stroebe and Schutt (1999).

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Grief symptoms	6 months after the start of the intervention	Texas Revised Inventory of Grief (German version, Znoj,2008; Faschingbauer, 1981)
Psychological distress	6 months after the start of the intervention	Brief Symptom Inventory (German version, Franke, 2000)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Depression symptoms	6 months after the start of the intervention	Beck Depression Inventory II (German version, Hautzinger, Kühne \& Keller, 2006)
Satisfaction with life	6 months after the start of the intervention	Satisfaction with life scale (German version, Schumacher, 2003)
Embitterment	6 months after the start of the intervention	Embitterment questionnaire (Znoj \&, Schyder, 2014)

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

University of Bern; 🇨🇭 Bern, Switzerland