Trial of the Clinical and Cost Effectiveness of a Specialist Expert Mood Disorder Team for Refractory Unipolar Depressive Disorder

Overview

The purpose of this study is determine whether a specialised mood disorder service, which offers tailored psychological and pharmacological treatment, is more effective in the treatment of chronic unipolar depressive disorder then treatment as usual.

A pragmatic randomised controlled trial of a specialist mood disorder intervention versus treatment as usual will be conducted. Patients will be individually randomised with stratification by mental health trust to either treatment by a specialist team offering tailored psychological and pharmacological treatment or treatment as usual. The specialist mood disorders team will include a psychiatrist and health professionals providing cognitive behaviour therapy. Together the team will assess participants and then provide a co-ordinated and supervised combination of pharmacological and psychological treatment according to guidelines developed by NICE and the British Association of Psychopharmacology. Each participant will receive a treatment plan that is tailored to his/her specific needs. The participants in the treatment as usual team will have their usual access to the same treatments. The outcome in terms of improvement in depressive symptoms, function and costs will be examined after one year in service users with chronic depression. Eligible patients will be followed for 12 months and the primary outcomes will be observer rated depressive symptoms and cost effectiveness from a health and social care perspective. Along side the RCT, implementation analysis and audit of the standard care and specialised care for depression will be carried out.

Conditions

Interventions

Eligibility

Locations (3)

Outcomes

Central Contacts