EBD Blog

As a graduate student, I had the good fortune to work on family intervention projects that were then housed at Oregon Research Institute and are now part of the Oregon Social Learning Project. The foundational work on family intervention conducted there by G. Patterson and J. Reid probably is strongly represented in the studies reviewed in this report, the abstract for which I found on PUBMED. (I know this is not exactly news—the review is nearly a year old—to those who keep up with the research, but it may be of interest to other readers…O.K., maybe one of you folks.)

J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2005 Sep;44(9):872-87.

Family-based treatment research: a 10-year update.

Diamond G, Josephson A.

Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and The Center for Family Intervention Science, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. gdiamond@psych.upenn.edu

OBJECTIVE: To provide an update on the state of the art of family-based treatment research. METHOD: Randomized clinical trials conducted in the past 10 years that included parents as a primary participant in treatment of child and adolescent psychiatric problems were reviewed. Studies were identified from major literature search engines (e.g., PsycINFO, Medline). Current significant pilot work was identified in the National Institute of Mental Health Computer Retrieval of Information on Scientific Projects (CRISP) Web page or from the authors themselves. RESULTS: Family treatments have proven effective with externalizing disorders, particularly conduct and substance abuse disorders, and in reducing the comorbid family and school behavior problems associated with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Several new studies suggest that family treatments or treatment augmented by family treatments are effective for depression and anxiety. CONCLUSIONS: For many disorders, family treatments can be an effective stand-alone intervention or an augmentation to other treatments. Engaging parents in the treatment process and reducing the toxicity of a negative family environment can contribute to better treatment engagement, retention, compliance, effectiveness, and maintenance of gains. Recommendations for the next decade of research and some implications of family-based treatment for child and adolescent psychiatry are explored.

Link to the abstract at the JAACAP site.