Does Exposure to Internal Cues Enhance Exposure to External Cues in Agoraphobia with Panic?

Background: Cognitive models of panic disorder are becoming more and more influential. Therefore, research specifying cognitive processes related to panic disorder is needed. The present study investigated memory bias for panic-related material in patients with panic disorder. Methods: Memory bias for panic-related material was investigated experimentally by a memory task requiring classification of panic-related and non-panic-related words. Sixty patients with panic disorder and 60 controls with no diagnosis of a mental disorder participated in the study. Results: As expected, panic patients showed smaller differences in the time needed for classification of panic-related versus non-panic-related material than controls. Conclusions: Patients with panic disorder show a memory bias for panic-related material when conceptual implicit recall is required. In order to clarify whether this bias is involved in the maintenance of the disorder, it seems important to investigate whether the bias is still present after successful therapy.

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Do Patients with Panic Disorder Show a Memory Bias?

Neidhardt

Florin²

1998

“…In conclusion, our patients had consolidated their gains during their further 3.5-year follow-up, especially those who had had exposure during the trial [16]. They were by no means cured in that some residual symptoms, like mild avoidance, fear and disability, as can be seen in table 1, were the rule and 11 had sought additional treat ment although this was unrelated to outcome [17],…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 71%

Agoraphobia and Panic Disorder: 3.5 Years after Alprazolam and/or Exposure Treatment

Kılıç

Noshirvani²,

Başoğlu³

et al. 1997

Background: Long-term follow-ups after controlled studies of exposure therapy for agoraphobia/panic are few. Most of these studies found that improvement during treatment persists to the end of follow-up. Methods: Out of 69 patients with panic disorder plus agoraphobia who had been in an 8-week controlled study of alprazolam and/or exposure, 31 were followed up at a mean of 3.5 years later (4 years after trial entry). The 31 patients followed up included more cases who had relapsed at week 43 than did the group which did not attend the 3.5-year follow-up. Results: As a group, followed-up cases maintained their gains over the 3.5 years, more so among ex-exposure than ex-relaxation cases. Ex-exposure patients did significantly better than relaxation patients on disability and survival time. Ex-alprazolam and ex-exposure patients did not differ significantly on any variable at the 3.5-year follow-up. No baseline variable predicted outcome at follow-up. Conclusions: Present results modestly confirm those of previous studies finding lasting improvement years after exposure, though some residual symptoms were the norm.

“…In contrast to im paired psychological functioning (c.g. depression) which may benefit from pharmacological treatment, anxiety is likely to respond to psychotherapeutic approaches [36], Finally, psychological well-being is another crucial vari able [37,38] in the assessment of functional status of patients with RA.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Relationship Between Self-Rated Functional Status and Psychosocial Stress in Patients Suffering from Rheumatoid Arthritis

Radanov

Schwarz²,

Frost³

et al. 1997

Background: To assess relationship between psychosocial factors and self-rated functioning in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Methods: In 66 RA patients (mean age ± SD = 50.8 + 12.6 years, women 49 (74%), illness duration mean ± SD = 13.4 ± 10.5 years) aspects of developmental psychosocial stress thought to influence human behavior were assessed in an in depth interview using structured biographical history. Furthermore evaluation included Trait anxiety, global functional status according to the ACR criteria, radiological staging of illness and patients’ self-ratings of functioning obtained by the Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ). Bivariate correlations were performed using psychosocial and somatic factors and self-rated functional status. Results: Scores of developmental psychosocial stress significantly correlated with interviewers scoring of nurture (r = ––0.722, p < 0.001) indicating good internal consistency of interview data. Significant correlations were found between patients’ scoring of functional status (HAQ) and (i) ACR criteria (r = 0.490, p < 0.0001) and (ii) score of Trait anxiety (r = 0.367, p < 0.003). There was no significant correlation between developmental psychosocial stress and HAQ score. Conclusion: Developmental psychosocial stress does not significantly contribute as to how RA patients perceive their functional ability. In a proportion of RA patients self-rated functional status may depend on the patients disposition (e.g. neuroticism) probably promoting impaired illness behavior (e.g. regressive tendencies) which should be considered in assessing treatment procedures.