Randomized Controlled Trial of False Safety Behavior Elimination Therapy: A Unified Cognitive Behavioral Treatment for Anxiety Psychopathology

Toward a Unified Treatment for Emotional Disorders: Update on the Science and Practice

“…Indeed, the Scopus database (accessed 13 April, 2015) indicates that the paper has been cited in 481 subsequent documents, with a highly informal search of the same database (accessed 13 April, 2015) using the search terms [("transdiagnostic" or "unified") and "anxiety"] yielding a growth Beyond the measureable impact, there has been a renewed interest in alternative nosological structures of NAS beyond the current DSM-IV and DSM-5 frameworks, and an emergence of broad-spectrum or transdiagnostic interventions for anxiety disorder specifically (e.g., Norton, 2012b) or NAS generally (e.g., Barlow et al, 2011) that have been developed in individual (e.g., McManus et al, 2014;Roy-Byrne et al, 2010;Teng et al, 2008), group (e.g., Dwyer et al, 2013;Erickson et al, 2007;Schmidt et al, 2012), and technology-delivered formats (e.g., Johnston, Titov, Andrews, Dear, & Spence, 2013), and have been tailored for populations including primary care patients (Ejeby et al, 2014;Roy-Byrne et al, 2010), U.S. military veterans (e.g., Gros, 2014), and specific cultural groups (e.g., de Ornelas Maia et al, 2013Lotfi et al, 2014;Mohammadi et al, 2014;Sanchez-Garcia, 2004). Meta-analyses (Norton & Philipp, 2008;Reinholt & Krogh, 2014) of the emerging evidence base for these interventions have converged on the following conclusion: clearly continued research is necessary, although remarkable empirical support has been generated for these propitious approaches to the treatment of our most prevalent and frequently comorbid psychological disorders.…”

“…In particular, despite efforts to provide transdiagnostic treatments to all NAS, including specific efforts geared towards PTSD and veterans (e.g., Gros, 2014;Gros et al, 2012) further work is needed to examine treatment effects in larger samples including OCD and PTSD (and related disorders), depressive disorders, as well as other disorders for which there is preliminary empirical support utilizing a transdiagnostic approach, such as emetophobia (for case study, see Paulus & Norton, under review), health anxiety , and unspecified anxiety that does not fit into current categories (Shafran, McManus, & Lee, 2008). Whereas results of the larger transdiagnostic CBT clinical trials have generally found no differences between diagnoses in transdiagnostic CBT, many of these trials were limited to examinations of GAD, panic disorder, and social phobia (e.g., Norton, 2012a;Norton et al, 2013;Schmidt et al, 2012). Farchione and colleagues (2012) extended these findings to include OCD, though the number of patients with OCD (n=8) was quite small, thus limiting generalizability.…”

“…Keough & Schmidt, 2012;Schmidt et al, 2007) including results from a randomized trial of a computerized anxiety sensitivity treatment for those at risk for anxiety and depression (as widespread research on particular features that cross-cut diagnoses will be. For example, emotion regulation may be a core process in NAS, it can also be considered an important feature in other diagnoses or conditions such as borderline personality disorder and self-injury (e.g., Gratz & Gunderson, 2006).…”

“…A full description of each protocol is beyond the scope of this review, although we will briefly identify some of emerging empirical support for these treatments. False Safety Behavior Elimination Therapy (F-SET; Schmidt et al, 2012) is a group treatment aimed at promoting "antiphobic" behavior, consistent with the Barlow et al (2004) A C C E P T E D M A N U S C R I P T…”

“…Results of one randomized controlled trial of F-SET vs. waitlist suggest that it is efficacious in treating patients with social phobia, GAD, or panic disorder (Schmidt et al, 2012).…”