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The Effects of Schema Therapy in Outpatient Forensic Mental Health Care: a Single Case Multiple-baseline Study.

NCT05523544 · Status: COMPLETED · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 5

Last updated 2025-09-19

No results posted yet for this study

Summary

Forensic psychiatry aims at reducing recidivism risk by treating mental or psychiatric problems. In forensic psychiatry approximately between 42 and 84% of the patients have PDs. Individuals with PDs have an increased risk of violence and a higher recidivism risk than offenders without PDs. Consequently, in outpatient forensic mental health settings, PDs are both assessed and treated.

Treatment of PDs with ST was demonstrated to be effective in regular mental health care. For forensic patients, ST was adjusted by adding specific modes. This adjustment showed promising results. However, this study was limited to closed forensic psychiatric hospitals where patients were admitted mandatorily.

In recent years, there has been a development in the field of personality and PDs with more attention for personality functioning (PF) as the core of personality pathology. This is described in Criterion A of the Alternative Model for Personality Disorders (AMPD) in the DSM-5 section III. Some instruments that measure PF, for instance the SIPP-118 are applicable to measure the change in PF as an effect of treatment. In forensic outpatient mental health, as far as we know, no specific instrument has been identified as a routine outcome monitoring during PD treatment.

This study will examine the outcome of ST for PDs in forensic outpatient mental health. To our knowledge this has not been studied before. We will examine three primary outcomes. A first outcome is measured in terms of changes towards more adaptive schemas and modes. A second outcome is defined in terms of reducing recidivism risk. Thirdly, we will investigate whether the concept of severity of PF as described in Criterion A of the AMPD in the DSM-5 is useful to monitor the effect of ST treatment for these patients.

Because having a PD is known to correlate with experiencing a lesser quality of life and having other psychological problems, these concepts are secondary outcome variables for the effect of treatment. Since the number of patients admitted for ST is limited, ST a long-term treatment is and patients must be willing to participate in a study, a Single Case Experimental Design (SCED) with a limited number of patients (N=8) seems to be the most applicable design.

Conditions

  • Personality Disorders

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

schematherapy

psychotherapy

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • Vrije Universiteit Brussel

    lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

  • Barbera van reijswoud, drs · Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Study Design

Allocation
NA
Purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
NONE
Model
SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Min Age
18 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2022-08-25
Primary Completion
2025-08-25
Completion
2025-08-25

Countries

  • Belgium

Study Locations

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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 NCT05523544 on ClinicalTrials.gov