A Family-based, Resilience-focused Intervention for War-affected Communities in North-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo

Phase 1

Completed

• Conditions: Psychological Distress
• Interventions: Behavioral: Family-Focused, Community-Based, Resilience-Targetting Psychosocial Intervention

• Registration Number: NCT01542398
• Lead Sponsor: Queen's University, Belfast

Brief Summary

The main research question of the study is whether a family-based, life-skills focused psychosocial intervention is effective in reducing psychological distress and stigma and improving inter-personal relations and functioning among war-affected children in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Detailed Description

Not available

Study Timeline

• Study First Submitted: 2012-02-21
• Study Start: 2012-03
• Study First Submitted QC: 2012-03-01
• Study First Posted: 2012-03-02
• Primary Completion: 2012-04
• Study Completion: 2012-07
• Results First Submitted: 2014-10-22
• Status Verified: 2018-06
• Results First Submitted QC: 2018-06-21
• Last Update Submitted: 2018-06-21
• Results First Posted: 2018-12-28
• Last Update Posted: 2018-12-28

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 159

Inclusion Criteria

• War-affected
• eastern Democratic Republic of Congo
• Formerly abducted child or vulnerable child

Exclusion Criteria

• severe/violent behavioural problems
• severe learning difficulties

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Family-Focused Psychosocial Intervention	Family-Focused, Community-Based, Resilience-Targetting Psychosocial Intervention	Intervention Group

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Reduction in Post-traumatic Stress Reaction Symptoms Among Participants	1-week before intervention, 3-weeks later	To assess post-traumatic stress reaction symptoms the 8-item Impact of Events Scale (CRIES-8) was used (Yule, 1997). Respondents indicating how frequently they experience a symptom on a 4-point Likert scale (0, 1, 2, 3). Thus the minimum score was 0 while the maximum score was 24. A high score indicates a high level of post-traumatic stress symptoms. This 8-item CRIES, which was designed for children over 7 years of age, has an identical factor structure to the 22-item version (Yule, 1997) which was previously validated with a sample of 1,046 war-affected adolescents in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (Mels, Derluyn, Broekaert \& Rosseel, 2010) (internal reliability range: 0·79 to 0·84; Cronbach's alpha for the total scale: 0·93). In the current study, internal consistency was 0·557.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
African Youth Psychosocial Assessment Inventory - Depression and Anxiety Subscales	pre-intervention, 3 weeks later	Internalising symptoms were assessed using the African Youth Psychosocial Assessment Instrument (AYPA) (Betancourt et al., 2009).This 17 item Likert (0 = minimum, 51 = maximum) measure was developed in northern Uganda after extensive qualitative consultation with young people, caregivers and mental health workers. A high score on the AYPA indicates a high level of internalizing symptoms. It is the only African developed, validated questionnaire available, had been used in separate studies with war-affected children in the DR Congo (McMullen et al., 2013; O'Callaghan, McMullen, Shannon, Rafferty \& Black; 2013) and includes symptoms of distress which do not appear in Western-developed measures (e.g. muttering to oneself, feeling pain in your heart, sitting with your head in your hand etc.). Test-retest reliability (carried out with a subset of 30 participants) for the AYPA was 0·91, inter-rater reliability was 0·58 (n = 26) and internal consistency was 0·787 (internalising symptoms).

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Dungu; 🇨🇬 Dungu, Haut-Uele, Congo