The Relationship of Rumination, Worry and OCD Symptoms During Technology Supported Mindfulness Therapy for OCD.

BACKGROUND: In this study, we re-examined data from a previous randomized controlled trial investigating 'technology supported mindfulness' (TSM)-an 8-week treatment intervention for individuals experiencing OCD. The current analysis involves an examination of the longitudinal relationships between rumination, worry and OCD symptom changes during mindfulness treatment, in comparison to a waitlist control. METHODS: Participants experiencing OCD (n = 71) were randomly assigned to 8 weeks of (1) TSM or (2) waitlist control. We tested the extent to which rumination (using the Ruminative Response Scale) and worry (using the Penn State Worry Questionnaire) are associated with OCD symptom changes during the acute phase of treatment, concurrently (i.e., within the same longitudinal model). RESULTS: Generalized linear model (GLM) results indicated a significant time (week 1 vs. week 8) by condition interaction involving decreased rumination in the TSM condition: F(1, 61) = 13.37, p = 0.001, partial η2 = 0.18 and observed power = 0.94. A second GLM demonstrated decreased worry in the TSM condition: F(1, 69) = 37.34, p = 0.001, partial η2 = 0.35 and observed power = 0.83. Longitudinal 'latent difference' structural equation analyses demonstrated a cross-lagged association between worry (but not rumination) and OCD symptom changes. CONCLUSIONS: Individuals in the TSM condition experienced greater reductions in rumination and worry during 8 weeks of TSM treatment compared to the waitlist control, and reduced worry predicted subsequent OCD symptom reduction.

Online versus in-person delivery of cognitive behaviour therapy for obsessive compulsive disorder: An examination of effectiveness.

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) including exposure and response prevention is the first-line psychological treatment for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). Given changes in the clinical landscape, there are increasing efforts to evaluate its effectiveness in online contexts. Mirroring the traditional in-person delivery, few studies have assessed the role of therapist-guided, manual-based CBT for OCD delivered in real-time via videoconferencing methods. The present study sought to fill this gap by comparing in-person and online delivery of group-based CBT for the treatment of OCD. A convenience sample of participants with moderate to severe OCD (n = 144) were recruited from a naturalistic database from two large OCD specialty assessment and treatment centres. Patients received group-based CBT that was provided in-person (pre-COVID-19 pandemic; March 2018 to March 2020) or online via videoconferencing (during the COVID-19 pandemic; March 2020 to April 2021). In both delivery methods, treatment consisted of 2-h weekly sessions led by trained clinicians. Analyses revealed that, regardless of treatment modality, both in-person and online groups demonstrated significant, reliable, and statistically equivalent improvements in OCD symptoms post-treatment. Videoconferenced, clinician-led CBT may be a promising alternative to in-person delivery for those with moderate to severe OCD symptoms.

Non-pharmacological management of infant and young child procedural pain.

BACKGROUND: Despite evidence of the long-term implications of unrelieved pain during infancy, it is evident that infant pain is still under-managed and unmanaged. Inadequately managed pain in infancy, a period of exponential development, can have implications across the lifespan. Therefore, a comprehensive and systematic review of pain management strategies is integral to appropriate infant pain management. This is an update of a previously published review update in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (2015, Issue 12) of the same title. OBJECTIVES: To assess the efficacy and adverse events of non-pharmacological interventions for infant and child (aged up to three years) acute pain, excluding kangaroo care, sucrose, breastfeeding/breast milk, and music. SEARCH METHODS: For this update, we searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE-Ovid platform, EMBASE-OVID platform, PsycINFO-OVID platform, CINAHL-EBSCO platform and trial registration websites (ClinicalTrials.gov; International Clinical Trials Registry Platform) (March 2015 to October 2020). An update search was completed in July 2022, but studies identified at this point were added to 'Awaiting classification' for a future update.  We also searched reference lists and contacted researchers via electronic list-serves.  We incorporated 76 new studies into the review.  SELECTION CRITERIA: Participants included infants from birth to three years in randomised controlled trials (RCTs) or cross-over RCTs that had a no-treatment control comparison. Studies were eligible for inclusion in the analysis if they compared a non-pharmacological pain management strategy to a no-treatment control group (15 different strategies). In addition, we also analysed studies when the unique effect of adding a non-pharmacological pain management strategy onto another pain management strategy could be assessed (i.e. additive effects on a sweet solution, non-nutritive sucking, or swaddling) (three strategies). The eligible control groups for these additive studies were sweet solution only, non-nutritive sucking only, or swaddling only, respectively. Finally, we qualitatively described six interventions that met the eligibility criteria for inclusion in the review, but not in the analysis.  DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: The outcomes assessed in the review were pain response (reactivity and regulation) and adverse events. The level of certainty in the evidence and risk of bias were based on the Cochrane risk of bias tool and the GRADE approach. We analysed the standardised mean difference (SMD) using the generic inverse variance method to determine effect sizes.  MAIN RESULTS: We included total of 138 studies (11,058 participants), which includes an additional 76 new studies for this update. Of these 138 studies, we analysed 115 (9048 participants) and described 23 (2010 participants) qualitatively. We described qualitatively studies that could not be meta-analysed due to being the only studies in their category or statistical reporting issues. We report the results of the 138 included studies here. An SMD effect size of 0.2 represents a small effect, 0.5 a moderate effect, and 0.8 a large effect. The thresholds for the I2 interpretation were established as follows: not important (0% to 40%); moderate heterogeneity (30% to 60%); substantial heterogeneity (50% to 90%); considerable heterogeneity (75% to 100%). The most commonly studied acute procedures were heel sticks (63 studies) and needlestick procedures for the purposes of vaccines/vitamins (35 studies). We judged most studies to have high risk of bias (103 out of 138), with the most common methodological concerns relating to blinding of personnel and outcome assessors. Pain responses were examined during two separate pain phases: pain reactivity (within the first 30 seconds after the acutely painful stimulus) and immediate pain regulation (after the first 30 seconds following the acutely painful stimulus). We report below the strategies with the strongest evidence base for each age group. In preterm born neonates, non-nutritive sucking may reduce pain reactivity (SMD -0.57, 95% confidence interval (CI) -1.03 to -0.11, moderate effect; I2 = 93%, considerable heterogeneity) and improve immediate pain regulation (SMD -0.61, 95% CI -0.95 to -0.27, moderate effect; I2 = 81%, considerable heterogeneity), based on very low-certainty evidence. Facilitated tucking may also reduce pain reactivity (SMD -1.01, 95% CI -1.44 to -0.58, large effect; I2 = 93%, considerable heterogeneity) and improve immediate pain regulation (SMD -0.59, 95% CI -0.92 to -0.26, moderate effect; I2 = 87%, considerable heterogeneity); however, this is also based on very low-certainty evidence. While swaddling likely does not reduce pain reactivity in preterm neonates (SMD -0.60, 95% CI -1.23 to 0.04, no effect; I2 = 91%, considerable heterogeneity), it has been shown to possibly improve immediate pain regulation (SMD -1.21, 95% CI -2.05 to -0.38, large effect; I2 = 89%, considerable heterogeneity), based on very low-certainty evidence. In full-term born neonates, non-nutritive sucking may reduce pain reactivity (SMD -1.13, 95% CI -1.57 to -0.68, large effect; I2 = 82%, considerable heterogeneity) and improve immediate pain regulation (SMD -1.49, 95% CI -2.20 to -0.78, large effect; I2 = 92%, considerable heterogeneity), based on very low-certainty evidence.  In full-term born older infants, structured parent involvement was the intervention most studied. Results showed that this intervention has little to no effect in reducing pain reactivity (SMD -0.18, 95% CI -0.40 to 0.03, no effect; I2 = 46%, moderate heterogeneity) or improving immediate pain regulation (SMD -0.09, 95% CI -0.40 to 0.21, no effect; I2 = 74%, substantial heterogeneity), based on low- to moderate-certainty evidence. Of these five interventions most studied, only two studies observed adverse events, specifically vomiting (one preterm neonate) and desaturation (one full-term neonate hospitalised in the NICU) following the non-nutritive sucking intervention. The presence of considerable heterogeneity limited our confidence in the findings for certain analyses, as did the preponderance of evidence of very low to low certainty based on GRADE judgements. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: Overall, non-nutritive sucking, facilitated tucking, and swaddling may reduce pain behaviours in preterm born neonates. Non-nutritive sucking may also reduce pain behaviours in full-term neonates. No interventions based on a substantial body of evidence showed promise in reducing pain behaviours in older infants. Most analyses were based on very low- or low-certainty grades of evidence and none were based on high-certainty evidence. Therefore, the lack of confidence in the evidence would require further research before we could draw a definitive conclusion.

Longitudinal changes in intolerance of uncertainty and worry severity during CBT for generalized anxiety disorder.

Intolerance of uncertainty (IU) is a key construct in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), but little is known about the concurrent and temporal patterns of associations between IU and GAD symptom severity during treatment. In addition, most of the extant literature focuses on IU as a unidimensional construct, whereas some researchers conceptualize IU as being comprised of two dimensions, inhibitory and prospective IU. Ninety individuals with GAD completed measures of IU and worry severity at pre-treatment, session 4, session 8, and end of treatment (session 12), during group-based cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) for GAD. Longitudinal multilevel modeling showed that IU predicted worry severity concurrently, but not prospectively over time; this pattern of associations was found with the total IUS score and the inhibitory (but not prospective) subscale score. Further, the relationship between IU total scores and worry severity became stronger over time. The relationship between inhibitory (but not prospective) IU and worry also became stronger over time. When the order of the variables in the model was reversed, worry severity also predicted concurrent but not future IU. Therefore, change in IU is associated with change in worry throughout the course of CBT, particularly as treatment progresses, though its directional association as a cause and/or effect remains unclear.

Do infant behaviors following immunization predict attachment? An exploratory study.

OBJECTIVES: The relationship between infant behaviors during routine immunization, pre- and post-needle, and infant attachment was explored. METHODS: A total of 130 parent-infant dyads were recruited from a larger longitudinal study and videotaped during routine immunization at 12 months and the Strange Situation Procedure (SSP) at 14 months. Six infant behaviors were coded for 1-minute pre-needle and 3-minutes post-needle. Attachment was operationalized according to the secure/avoidant/resistant/disorganized categories. RESULTS: As expected, none of the pre-needle behaviors predicted attachment. Proximity-seeking post-needle significantly discriminated attachment categorizations. Secure infants were more likely to seek proximity to caregivers post-needle in comparison with avoidant and disorganized infants. Proximity-seeking following immunization was positively correlated with proximity-seeking during the SSP and negatively correlated with avoidance and disorganization during the SSP. CONCLUSIONS: Infant proximity-seeking during immunization is associated with attachment security and parallels behaviors observed during the SSP. More research is needed to identify behavioral markers of disorganization.

Non-pharmacological management of infant and young child procedural pain.

BACKGROUND: Infant acute pain and distress is commonplace. Infancy is a period of exponential development. Unrelieved pain and distress can have implications across the lifespan.  This is an update of a previously published review in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Issue 10 2011 entitled 'Non-pharmacological management of infant and young child procedural pain'. OBJECTIVES: To assess the efficacy of non-pharmacological interventions for infant and child (up to three years) acute pain, excluding kangaroo care, and music. Analyses were run separately for infant age (preterm, neonate, older) and pain response (pain reactivity, immediate pain regulation).  SEARCH METHODS: For this update, we searched the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) in The Cochrane Library (Issue 2 of 12, 2015), MEDLINE-Ovid platform (March 2015), EMBASE-OVID platform (April 2011 to March 2015), PsycINFO-OVID platform (April 2011 to February 2015), and CINAHL-EBSCO platform (April 2011 to March 2015). We also searched reference lists and contacted researchers via electronic list-serves. New studies were incorporated into the review. We refined search strategies with a Cochrane-affiliated librarian. For this update, nine articles from the original 2011 review pertaining to Kangaroo Care were excluded, but 21 additional studies were added. SELECTION CRITERIA: Participants included infants from birth to three years. Only randomised controlled trials (RCTs) or RCT cross-overs that had a no-treatment control comparison were eligible for inclusion in the analyses. However, when the additive effects of a non-pharmacological intervention could be assessed, these studies were also included. We examined studies that met all inclusion criteria except for study design (e.g. had an active control) to qualitatively contextualize results. There were 63 included articles in the current update. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Study quality ratings and risk of bias were based on the Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool and GRADE approach. We analysed the standardized mean difference (SMD) using the generic inverse variance method. MAIN RESULTS: Sixty-three studies, with 4905 participants, were analysed. The most commonly studied acute procedures were heel-sticks (32 studies) and needles (17 studies). The largest SMD for treatment improvement over control conditions on pain reactivity were: non-nutritive sucking-related interventions (neonate: SMD -1.20, 95% CI -2.01 to -0.38) and swaddling/facilitated tucking (preterm: SMD -0.89; 95% CI -1.37 to -0.40). For immediate pain regulation, the largest SMDs were: non-nutritive sucking-related interventions (preterm: SMD -0.43; 95% CI -0.63 to -0.23; neonate: SMD -0.90; 95% CI -1.54 to -0.25; older infant: SMD -1.34; 95% CI -2.14 to -0.54), swaddling/facilitated tucking (preterm: SMD -0.71; 95% CI -1.00 to -0.43), and rocking/holding (neonate: SMD -0.75; 95% CI -1.20 to -0.30). Fifty two of our 63 trials did not report adverse events. The presence of significant heterogeneity limited our confidence in the findings for certain analyses, as did the preponderance of very low quality evidence. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: There is evidence that different non-pharmacological interventions can be used with preterms, neonates, and older infants to significantly manage pain behaviors associated with acutely painful procedures. The most established evidence was for non-nutritive sucking, swaddling/facilitated tucking, and rocking/holding. All analyses reflected that more research is needed to bolster our confidence in the direction of the findings. There are significant gaps in the existing literature on non-pharmacological management of acute pain in infancy.

Naturalistic parental pain management during immunizations during the first year of life: observational norms from the OUCH cohort.

No research to date has descriptively catalogued what parents of healthy infants are naturalistically doing to manage their infant's pain over immunization appointments during the first year of life. This knowledge, in conjunction with an understanding of the relationships different parental techniques have with infant pain-related distress, would be useful when attempting to target parental pain management strategies in the infant immunization context. This study presents descriptive information about the pain management techniques parents have chosen and examines the relationships these naturalistic techniques have with infant pain-related distress during the first year of life. A total of 760 parent-infant dyads were recruited from 3 pediatric clinics in Toronto, ON, Canada, and were naturalistically followed and videotaped longitudinally over 4 immunization appointments during the infant's first year of life. Infants were full-term, healthy babies. Videotapes were subsequently coded for infant pain-related distress behaviors and parental pain management techniques. After controlling for preceding infant pain-related distress levels, parent pain management techniques accounted for, at most, 13% of the variance in infant pain-related distress scores. Across all age groups, physical comfort, rocking, and verbal reassurance were the most commonly used nonpharmacological pain management techniques. Pacifying and distraction appeared to be most promising in reducing needle-related distress in our sample of healthy infants. Parents in this sample seldom used pharmacological pain management techniques. Given the psychological and physical repercussions involved with unmanaged repetitive acute pain and the paucity of work in healthy infants, this paper highlights key areas for improving parental pain management in primary care.

Nonpharmacological management of procedural pain in infants and young children: an abridged Cochrane review.

BACKGROUND: Acute pain and distress during medical procedures are commonplace for young children. OBJECTIVE: To assess the efficacy of nonpharmacological interventions for acute procedural pain in children up to three years of age. METHODS: Study inclusion criteria were: participants <3 years of age, involved in a randomized controlled or crossover trial, and use of a 'no treatment' control group (51 studies; n=3396). Additional studies meeting all criteria except for study design (eg, use of active control group) were qualitatively described (n=20). RESULTS: For every intervention, data were analyzed separately according to age group (preterm-born, term-born neonate and older infant / young child) and type of pain response (pain reactivity, immediate pain-related regulation). The largest standardized mean differences (SMD) for pain reactivity were as follows: sucking-related interventions (preterm: -0.42 [95% CI -0.68 to -0.15]; neonate -1.45 [CI -2.34 to -0.57]), kangaroo care (preterm -1.12 [95% CI -2.04 to -0.21]), and swaddling / facilitated tucking (preterm -0.97 [95% CI -1.63 to -0.31]). For immediate pain-related regulation, the largest SMDs were: sucking-related interventions (preterm -0.38 [95% CI -0.59 to -0.17]; neonate -0.90 [CI -1.54 to -0.25]), kangaroo care 0.77 (95% CI -1.50 to -0.03]), swaddling / facilitated tucking (preterm -0.75 [95% CI -1.14 to -0.36]), and rocking / holding (neonate -0.75 [95% CI -1.20 to -0.30]). The presence of significant heterogeneity limited confidence in nonsignificant findings for certain other analyses. CONCLUSIONS: Although a number of nonpharmacological treatments have sufficient evidence supporting their efficacy with preterm infants and healthy neonates, no treatments had sufficient evidence to support efficacy with healthy older infants / young children.