Brief cognitive–behavioural therapy for patients in the community with schizophrenia: Randomised controlled trial in Beijing, China

Abstract

Brief cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) is an emerging treatment for schizophrenia in community settings; however, further trials are needed, especially in non-Western countries.To test the effects of brief CBT for Chinese patients with schizophrenia in the community (trial registration: ChiCTR-TRC-13003709).A total of 220 patients with schizophrenia from four districts of Beijing were randomly assigned to either brief CBT plus treatment as usual (TAU) or TAU alone. Patients were assessed at baseline, post-treatment and at 6- and 12-month follow-ups by raters masked to group allocation.At the post-treatment assessment and the 12-month follow-up, patients who received brief CBT showed greater improvement in overall symptoms, general psychopathology, insight and social functioning. In total, 37.3% of those in the brief CBT plus TAU group experienced a clinically significant response, compared with only 19.1% of those in the TAU alone group ( = 0.003).Brief CBT has a positive effect on Chinese patients with schizophrenia in the community.

Insight in schizophrenia spectrum disorders: relationship with behavior, mood and perceived quality of life, underlying causes and emerging treatments

“…A brief culturally adapted version of CBT-p was also linked with improvements in insight 162,163 . Drake et al 164 found that cognitive therapy which followed cognitive remediation was linked to greater improvements in clinical insight in psychosis.…”

Cognitive therapy of psychosis: Research and implementation

“…Similar approaches have been proposed for psychosis and a small number of studies have explored this successfully e.g. combined individual CBTp and family work (Guo et al, 2017), guided self-help and a worry intervention for paranoia (Freeman et al, 2015). However there have been no studies yet comparing standard with brief intervention (Naeem et al, 2015a).…”

Ensuring research integrity: setting standards for robust and ethical conduct and reporting of research

“…Published in BJPsych, following two rounds of peer review and revisions, Guo and colleagues concluded in their paper that brief CBT had a positive effect on Chinese patients with schizophrenia. 1 The abstract stated:…”

“…In total, 37.3% of those in the brief CBT plus TAU group experienced a clinically significant response, compared with only 19.1% of those in the TAU alone group (P = 0.003).' 1 Following publication, some readers expressed concerns about the reporting of the findings, suggesting there was undue emphasis on the positive rather than negative findings. Initially, we considered this to be a reporting issue.…”