Emotionally Focused Interventions for Couples With Chronically Ill Children: A 2‐year Follow‐up

Abstract

Couples with chronically ill children are particularly at risk for experiencing marital distress. The study presented here is a 2-year follow-up of a randomized control trial that assessed the efficacy of Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) in decreasing marital distress in a sample of couples with a chronically ill child. Thirteen couples with chronically ill children who received treatment were assessed to determine if the significant improvement in relationship distress observed at posttreatment and 5-month follow-up would be maintained at 2-year follow-up. Results demonstrated that improvements in marital functioning were not only maintained but, in some cases, enhanced at the 2-year follow-up. This uncontrolled follow-up study provides initial evidence of the longer-term benefits of EFT.

Social Baseline Theory: the social regulation of risk and effort

“…Recent interpersonal approaches to psychotherapy suggest, for example, that couple-level interventions are not only efficacious for treating relationship distress, but also for leveraging social resources in our understanding and treatment of, for example, borderline personality disorder [41], post traumatic stress disorder [42], obsessive-compulsive disorder [43], heart disease [44,45], the suffering associated with cancer [46], and the emotional burden of caring for chronically ill child children [47]. This and related work suggest real potential for the application of social resources in prevention and treatment of a wide array of medical and psychological difficulties [48,49].…”

Evidence-Based Couple Therapy for Chronic Illnesses: Enriching the Emotional Quality of Relationships With Emotionally Focused Therapy

“…In a 2-year follow-up study by Cloutier et al (2002), parents of chronically ill children, who participated in short-term EFT, experienced improvements in marital functioning. Future research should continue to build on these preliminary findings to demonstrate the benefits of EFT for chronically ill populations.…”

A Report: Couples with Medical Conditions, Attachment Theoretical Perspectives and Evidence for Emotionally-Focused Couples Therapy

“…The utility of EFT for treating couples with a chronically ill child has been established (Walker et al 1996); importantly, treatment gains from this intervention were sustained or increased at two-year follow up (Cloutier et al 2002). Positive treatment outcomes for EFT couples interventions have been found in a range of other medical populations; for example, for breast cancer survivors (Naaman et al in press), stroke with associated aphasia (Ryan et al 2008) and depression (see Denton and Coffey 2011 for a review).…”