Fredrika Norlund

Cognitive distortions in recovered burn patients: the emotional Stroop task and autobiographical memory test.

The aim of the study was to explore cognitive distortions in recovered burn patients. Previous studies in trauma patients have shown trauma-specific attentional bias, long response latencies, and deficits in memory specificity. Eighteen former patients, burn injured 5-19 years ago and 18 matched controls performed the emotional Stroop task, including burn and general trauma-related words, and the autobiographical memory test (AMT). In addition, verbal fluency, life events, and current mood were assessed. Regarding the Stroop task, the recovered patients had longer response latencies to burn words than to neutral and trauma words, a difference not seen in the control subjects. Regarding the AMT, the memory specificity did not differ between the groups. Overall, the former patients had longer latencies than the controls and poorer verbal fluency. The present study showed that recovered burn patients display a moderate Stroop effect, i.e. an attentional bias, in spite of the fact that the injury occurred several years before the testing. This may imply that the recovered burn patients consider the burn an important issue in life. The post-burn patients also presented signs of a slight cognitive slowness as compared to the controls. This finding deserves further attention in the rehabilitation of burn patients.

Psychological mediators related to clinical outcome in cognitive behavioural therapy for coronary heart disease: A sub-analysis from the SUPRIM trial:

Background The Secondary Prevention in Uppsala Primary Healthcare Project (SUPRIM) was a randomized controlled trial of a group-based cognitive behavioural therapy stress management programme for patients with coronary heart disease. The project was successful in reducing the risk of fatal or non-fatal first recurrent cardiovascular events. The aim of this study was to analyse the effect of cognitive behavioural therapy on self-rated stress, somatic anxiety, vital exhaustion and depression and to study the associations of these factors with the reduction in cardiovascular events. Methods A total of 362 patients were randomly assigned to intervention or usual care groups. The psychological outcomes were assessed five times during 24 months and analysed using linear mixed models. The mediating roles of the outcomes were analysed using joint modelling of the longitudinal and time to event data. Results The intervention had a positive effect on somatic anxiety (p < 0.05), reflecting a beneficial development over time compared with the controls. Stress, vital exhaustion and depression did not differ between the groups over time. Mediator analysis suggested that somatic anxiety may have mediated the effect of treatment on cardiovascular events. Conclusions The intervention had a small positive effect on somatic anxiety, but did not affect stress, vital exhaustion or depression in patients with coronary heart disease. Somatic anxiety was associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events and might act as a partial mediator in the treatment effect on cardiovascular events. However, the mechanisms between the intervention and the protective cardiovascular outcome remain to be identified.

Internet-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Symptoms of Depression and Anxiety Among Patients With a Recent Myocardial Infarction: The U-CARE Heart Randomized Controlled Trial

Background Symptoms of depression and anxiety are common after a myocardial infarction (MI). Internet-based cognitive behavioral therapy (iCBT) has shown good results in other patient groups. Objective The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of an iCBT treatment to reduce self-reported symptoms of depression and anxiety among patients with a recent MI. Methods In total, 3928 patients were screened for eligibility in 25 Swedish hospitals. Of these, 239 patients (33.5%, 80/239 women, mean age 60 years) with a recent MI and symptoms of depression or anxiety were randomly allocated to a therapist-guided, 14-week iCBT treatment (n=117), or treatment as usual (TAU; n=122). The iCBT treatment was designed for post-MI patients. The primary outcome was the total score of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) 14 weeks post baseline, assessed over the internet. Treatment effect was evaluated according to the intention-to-treat principle, with multiple imputations. For the main analysis, a pooled treatment effect was estimated, controlling for age, sex, and baseline HADS. Results There was a reduction in HADS scores over time in the total study sample (mean delta=−5.1, P<.001) but no difference between the study groups at follow-up (beta=−0.47, 95% CI −1.95 to 1.00, P=.53). Treatment adherence was low. A total of 46.2% (54/117) of the iCBT group did not complete the introductory module. Conclusions iCBT treatment for an MI population did not result in lower levels of symptoms of depression or anxiety compared with TAU. Low treatment adherence might have influenced the result. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01504191; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01504191 (Archived at Webcite at http://www.webcitation.org/6xWWSEQ22)

Factors associated with emotional distress in patients with myocardial infarction: Results from the SWEDEHEART registry.

Background Emotional distress, symptoms of depression and anxiety, is common among patients after a myocardial infarction (MI), and is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular morbidity. Real world population data on factors associated with emotional distress in MI patients are scarce. The aim was to determine factors associated with incident emotional distress two and 12 months post MI respectively, and with persistent emotional distress, versus remittent, in patients <75 years old. Design This was a registry-based observational study. Methods Data from the national SWEDEHEART registry on 27,267 consecutive patients with a first-time MI, followed up at two and 12 months post MI (n = 22,911), were included in the analyses. Emotional distress was assessed with the EuroQol-5D questionnaire. Several candidate sociodemographic and clinical factors were analysed for their association with emotional distress in multivariate models. Results Symptoms of emotional distress were prevalent in 38% and 33% at two and 12 months post MI respectively. At both time-points, previous depression and/or anxiety, readmission for new cardiovascular event, female gender, younger age, born outside the neighbouring Nordic countries, smoking and being neither employed nor retired showed the strongest associations with emotional distress. Other factors related to medical history, the MI and its care or were only modestly associated with emotional distress. Persistent emotional distress was associated with younger age, female gender, smoking and being born outside of the Nordic countries. Conclusion Previous depression/anxiety, female gender, younger age, smoking, born outside of the Nordic countries, neither employed nor retired and readmission due to cardiovascular events were strongly associated with emotional distress post MI. These factors may be of relevance in tailoring rehabilitation programmes.

The effect of group-based cognitive behavioral therapy on inflammatory biomarkers in patients with coronary heart disease—results from the SUPRIM-trial

Abstract Background: The Secondary Prevention in Uppsala Primary Healthcare Project (SUPRIM) is a prospective randomized controlled trial of a group-based cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) stress management program for coronary heart disease (CHD) patients. The intervention reduced the risk of fatal or non-fatal first recurrent cardiovascular (CV) events. The aim of the present study was to analyze if the positive effects of the CBT program on clinical outcomes could have been mediated by changes in biomarkers for inflammation. Methods: Altogether 362 patients with CHD were randomly assigned to intervention or usual care. The inflammatory biomarkers (VCAM-1, TNF-R1, TNF-R2, PTX3, and hs-CRP) were serially assessed at five time points every six months from study start until 24 months later, and analyzed with linear mixed models. Results: Baseline levels of the inflammatory markers were near normal, indicating a stable phase. The group-based CBT stress management program did not significantly affect the levels of inflammatory biomarkers in patients with CHD. Three out of five (VCAM-1, TNF-R2, and PTX3) inflammatory biomarkers showed a slight increase over time in both study groups, and all were positively associated with age. Conclusion: Group-based CBT stress management did not affect biomarkers for inflammation in patients with CHD. It is therefore unlikely that inflammatory processes including these biomarkers were mediating the effect the CBT program had on the reduction in CV events. The close to normal baseline levels of the biomarkers and the lack of elevated psychological distress symptoms indicate a possible floor effect which may have influenced the results.

Predicting Adherence to Internet-Delivered Psychotherapy for Symptoms of Depression and Anxiety After Myocardial Infarction: Machine Learning Insights From the U-CARE Heart Randomized Controlled Trial

Background Low adherence to recommended treatments is a multifactorial problem for patients in rehabilitation after myocardial infarction (MI). In a nationwide trial of internet-delivered cognitive behavior therapy (iCBT) for the high-risk subgroup of patients with MI also reporting symptoms of anxiety, depression, or both (MI-ANXDEP), adherence was low. Since low adherence to psychotherapy leads to a waste of therapeutic resources and risky treatment abortion in MI-ANXDEP patients, identifying early predictors for adherence is potentially valuable for effective targeted care. Objectives The goal of the research was to use supervised machine learning to investigate both established and novel predictors for iCBT adherence in MI-ANXDEP patients. Methods Data were from 90 MI-ANXDEP patients recruited from 25 hospitals in Sweden and randomized to treatment in the iCBT trial Uppsala University Psychosocial Care Programme (U-CARE) Heart study. Time point of prediction was at completion of the first homework assignment. Adherence was defined as having completed more than 2 homework assignments within the 14-week treatment period. A supervised machine learning procedure was applied to identify the most potent predictors for adherence available at the first treatment session from a range of demographic, clinical, psychometric, and linguistic predictors. The internal binary classifier was a random forest model within a 3×10–fold cross-validated recursive feature elimination (RFE) resampling which selected the final predictor subset that best differentiated adherers versus nonadherers. Results Patient mean age was 58.4 years (SD 9.4), 62% (56/90) were men, and 48% (43/90) were adherent. Out of the 34 potential predictors for adherence, RFE selected an optimal subset of 56% (19/34; Accuracy 0.64, 95% CI 0.61-0.68, P<.001). The strongest predictors for adherence were, in order of importance, (1) self-assessed cardiac-related fear, (2) sex, and (3) the number of words the patient used to answer the first homework assignment. Conclusions For developing and testing effective iCBT interventions, investigating factors that predict adherence is important. Adherence to iCBT for MI-ANXDEP patients in the U-CARE Heart trial was best predicted by cardiac-related fear and sex, consistent with previous research, but also by novel linguistic predictors from written patient behavior which conceivably indicate verbal ability or therapeutic alliance. Future research should investigate potential causal mechanisms and seek to determine what underlying constructs the linguistic predictors tap into. Whether these findings replicate for other interventions outside of Sweden, in larger samples, and for patients with other conditions who are offered iCBT should also be investigated. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01504191; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT01504191 (Archived at Webcite at http://www.webcitation.org/6xWWSEQ22)

The Development and Feasablity of an Internet-Based Cognitive Behavioral Intervention to reduce Depression and/or Anxiety after a Myocardial Infarction - The U-CARE Heart study

The Development and Feasablity of an Internet-Based Cognitive Behavioral Intervention to reduce Depression and/or Anxiety after a Myocardial Infarction - The U-CARE Heart study