Experiences of running an anxiety management group for people with a learning disability using a cognitive behavioural intervention

Abstract

Accessible summary• We ran a group for 6 people with a learning disability who worry a lot. The group last for 12 weeks and each person in the group brought someone with them. • People said they found the group helpful. People said they learnt ways to cope when they get worried. • This research will help staff to think about how they can help people who worry a lot. More research is needed to find out which bits of the group were most helpful. SummaryAn anxiety management group utilizing a cognitive behavioural intervention, of 12 weeks duration, for six people with mild to moderate learning disabilities is described. A number of techniques to assist in developing clients' understanding of their anxiety, cognitive and behavioural coping strategies and maximizing generalizability of skills learnt were implemented. Outcome measures demonstrated that two participants showed a clinically significant reduction in anxiety levels. Qualitative feedback from both participants and carers suggested that all group members developed coping strategies. Measures also indicated that carers demonstrated a better understanding of the individual's difficulties and were able to support them more effectively. Adopting a cognitive behavioural approach proved valuable and recommendations for future interventions are made.

An evaluation of an emotion regulation programme for people with an intellectual disability

“…Three of the five participants involved in the Transformers programme exhibited fewer incidents of challenging behaviour following treatment. These results are consistent with recent research which shows that CBT interventions can improve coping strategies and reduce challenging behaviour in people with an ID (Douglass et al, 2007;Lindsay et al, 2004;Willner et al, 2005;Willner et al, 2013).…”

LIFT psychology primary care group for people with intellectual disabilities: can IAPT adapt?

“…The results suggest that some participants were more likely to talk about their problems and receive support from others by the end of the group. This is similar to finding by Douglass et al (2007) where at the end of their group, two participants reported they had developed more confidence to approach staff when they were worried. ' The two major causes of anxiety identified by participants were other people and change.…”

“…This is significantly smaller than LIFT groups, typically with 20-30 people. Research into therapeutic groups for people with intellectual disabilities report sizes between six and nine (Douglass et al, 2007;Rose, 2010). Although this increased demand in resources is something the local teams agreed to commit to for the pilot, it is unclear whether this is cost effective and sustainable within the context of a resource-pressured NHS.…”

“…Also that adjustments to anxiety management techniques using the principles of CBT can be effective when running psychoeducational groups for people with mild or moderate intellectual disabilities (Turk and Francis, 1990;Douglass et al, 2007). Positive outcomes include improvements in abdominal breathing techniques (Turk and Francis, 1990), new coping strategies, and in some cases, clinical reduction in anxiety levels (Douglass et al, 2007).…”

Putting the C into CBT: Cognitive challenging with adults with mild to moderate intellectual disabilities and anxiety disorders

“…Implementing cognitive challenging for adults with ID remains a clinical challenge (Douglass, Palmer, & O'Connor, 2007) and requires a more comprehensive level of description in the literature (Dagnan & Jahoda, 2006). To progress the use of cognitive challenging for people with ID in both research and practice, this article introduces a framework to modify cognitive challenging and also present results from a pilot evaluation of a broader CBT-ID group programme for anxiety.…”