Multiple Symptoms Study: a feasibility study of a GP with special interest clinic for patients with multiple medically unexplained symptoms (MMUS)

Completed

Conditions: Medically unexplained symptoms/ somatisation
Mental and Behavioural Disorders
Somatoform disorders

Registration Number: ISRCTN63083469

Lead Sponsor: niversity of Edinburgh (UK)

Brief Summary: Not available

Detailed Description: Not available

Recruitment & Eligibility

Status: Completed

Sex: All

Target Recruitment: 120

Inclusion Criteria

Patients will be eligible for inclusion if they are aged 18-64 (both males and females) and meet all of the following four criteria:
1. They have been referred at least twice to hospital outpatients in the last three years. Where referral data is only available for shorter periods the number of referrals required may be reduced.
2. Their general practice electronic notes summary does not contain any of a list of diagnostic codes representing serious illness (coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, severe mental illness)
3. Their general practice electronic notes summary contains one or more diagnostic codes potentially indicating an MUS disorder. These codes include both MUS syndromes (e.g. fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, tension headache) and specific codes for a negative investigation which is commonly carried out for symptoms (e.g. normal endoscopy)
4. Have a Patient Health Questionnaire-14 (PHQ-14) score of >9

Exclusion Criteria

1. They are unable to provide informed consent to participate
2. Their GP regards their participation as clinically inappropriate
3. In the opinion of their GP, they either have a serious illness (e.g. heart disease, cancer, serious mental illness) which was not picked up on the database search or have other medical diagnoses which can fully explain their PHQ-14 score
4. They have serious illness related disability (for instance receiving daily personal care or using a wheelchair)
5. They are likely to have difficulty communicating by telephone
6. They are likely to have difficulty completing the forms and questionnaires
7. They express significant suicidal thoughts (PHQ-9 question 9 scoring >1)
8. They are currently undergoing multidisciplinary rehabilitation or management (e.g. pain clinic)
9. They are currently undergoing specialist psychological treatment