MedTrace Logo

Thriving in the Midst of Moral Pain: The Acceptability and Feasibility of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Moral Injury (ACT-MI) Among Warzone Veterans

NCT03760731 · Status: COMPLETED · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 74

Last updated 2025-12-29

Study results available
· View outcomes & findings →

Summary

The need for moral injury interventions is increasingly being recognized as a domain in Veteran care that must be addressed. Consequences of exposure to morally injurious events include risk for suicide, substance abuse, and refractory symptoms of PTSD and depression. Exposure to morally injurious events is also highly prevalent among Veterans. Thus, interventions addressing moral injury are crucial to helping Veterans build meaningful lives. Psychotherapies explicitly targeting moral injury and functional recovery associated with this construct are limited in VHA. The proposed study serves as a first step in addressing this gap in the literature through the development of a recovery-oriented, evidence-based treatment approach for moral injury among warzone Veterans who report functional impairments related to moral emotions. The proposed pilot study will evaluate the acceptability of this intervention and the feasibility of the design for a future study to test the treatment's capacity to improve patients' functioning.

Conditions

  • Moral Injury

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Moral Injury (ACT-MI)

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Moral Injury (ACT-MI) is a novel treatment protocol detailing the application of ACT for recovery from moral injury. ACT-MI is designed to help Veterans learn to interact differently with moral emotions and engage meaningfully in their lives. The 15-week intervention spans twelve, 90-minute group sessions and 3 30-minute individual case conceptualizing sessions. The current ACT-MI protocol was developed through an iterative process in which authors generated and refined the intervention based on clinical interactions with Veterans currently reporting moral injury.

BEHAVIORAL

Present Centered Therapy for Moral Injury (PCT-MI)

Present Centered Therapy for Moral Injury (PCT-MI) is a 15-week intervention consisting of 12 90-minute group sessions and 3 30-minute individual case conceptualizing sessions, focused on problem solving daily life difficulties related to moral injury rather than the experiential focus on moral emotions presented in ACT-MI. Because PCT has been established as an evidence-based active control condition, it is likely to serve as a beneficial transdiagnostic intervention in its own right.

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • VA Palo Alto Health Care System

    collaborator FED

  • VA Office of Research and Development

    lead FED

Principal Investigators

  • Lauren Borges, PhD · Rocky Mountain Regional VA Medical Center, Aurora, CO

Study Design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
SINGLE
Model
PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age
18 Years
Max Age
89 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2019-04-01
Primary Completion
2024-10-31
Completion
2024-10-31

Countries

  • United States

Study Locations

More Related Trials

Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT03760731 on ClinicalTrials.gov