Broglia, E., Millings, A. and Barkham, M. orcid.org/0000-0003-1687-6376 (2017) Comparing counselling alone versus counselling supplemented with guided use of a well-being app for university students experiencing anxiety or depression (CASELOAD): protocol for a feasibility trial. Pilot and Feasibility Studies, 3 (1). 3. ISSN 2055-5784
Abstract
BACKGROUND: University counselling services face a unique challenge to offer short-term therapeutic support to students presenting with complex mental health needs and in a setting which suits the academic timetable. The recent availability of mobile phone applications (apps) offers an opportunity to supplement face-to-face therapy and has the potential to reach a wider audience, maintain engagement between therapy sessions, and enhance therapeutic outcomes. The present study, entitled Counselling plus Apps for Students Experiencing Levels of Anxiety or Depression (CASELOAD), aims to explore the feasibility of supplementing counselling with guided use of a well-being app. METHODS/DESIGN: Forty help-seeking university students (aged 18 years and over) with symptoms of moderate anxiety or depression will be recruited from a University Counselling Service (UCS) in the United Kingdom (UK). Participants will be recruited via counsellors who provide the initial clinical assessment and who determine treatment allocation to one of two treatments on the basis of client-treatment fit. The two conditions comprise (1) counselling alone (treatment as usual/TAU) or (2) counselling supplemented with guided use of a well-being app (enhanced intervention). Trained counsellors will deliver up to six counselling sessions in each treatment arm across a 6-month period, and the session frequency will be decided by client-counsellor discussion. Assessments will occur at baseline, every counselling session, post-intervention (3 months after consent) and follow-up (6 months after consent). Assessments will include clinical measures of anxiety, depression, psychological functioning, specific mental health concerns (e.g. academic distress and substance misuse), resilience and therapeutic alliance. The usage, acceptability, feasibility and potential implications of combining counselling with guided use of the well-being app will be assessed through audio recordings of counselling sessions, telephone interviews with participants, focus groups with counsellors and counsellor notes. DISCUSSION: This study will inform the design of a randomised pilot trial and a definitive trial which aim to improve therapy engagement, reduce dropout and enhance clinical outcomes of student counselling. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN55102899.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s). 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
Keywords: | Student mental health; Anxiety; Depression; Counselling; Well-being app; Behaviour monitoring; Augmented therapy; Feasibility; Acceptability |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Science (Sheffield) > Department of Psychology (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 10 Feb 2017 10:20 |
Last Modified: | 30 Jun 2023 10:33 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | BioMed Central |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1186/s40814-016-0119-2 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:112064 |