STOP- Successful Treatment Of Paranoia: Replacing harmful paranoid thoughts with better alternatives

偏执狂与包括精神病在内的几种精神健康状况有关，并导致工作，家庭和社会功能的困扰和损害。最近的思想进步表明，如果他们一次专注于一个特定的症状并试图治疗它，而不是试图一次性治疗整个疾病，那么治疗可能会更有效。这项研究建议开发和测试一种名为CBM-pa的偏执狂新疗法的移动的应用程序版本。CBM-pa是一种自我管理的心理疗法，它是通过将偏执狂偏见的基础研究与可以改变这些偏见的既定技术相结合而开发的。CBM-pa是计算机化的，涉及阅读可能以偏执的方式解释的文本（例如可能反映有害意图的陌生人的凝视）。该疗法鼓励读者通过使用文字任务和问题来做出另一种解释（例如反映无害好奇心的凝视）。现已编制了一个六期会议版本，并完成了可行性研究，取得了可喜的成果。在本研究的第一年，我们将通过增加6个新创建的会话，将CBM-pa开发成一个更易于访问和吸引人的移动的手机12会话应用程序，称为STOP：成功治疗偏执狂。在第2-4年，我们将在常规治疗的同时给予患者STOP，并将其与对照条件进行比较，其中患者只是在移动的应用程序中阅读文本。该研究采用随机对照设计，从两个不同的英国研究中心招募患者。参与者将接受6或12次STOP治疗，我们将立即以及3个月和6个月后测量临床症状。这些治疗数据将与参加对照条件（阅读应用程序中的文本）的类似人员的数据进行比较，并同时进行评估。这些数据将告诉我们停止是否有任何有益的影响，如果有，它们会持续多久。我们还将更详细地测量到底有多少疗程产生了足够的临床有用的症状减轻。

Paranoia is linked to several mental health conditions, including psychosis and leads to distress and impairment in work, family and social functioning. Recent advances in thinking suggest that treatments might be more effective if they focus on one particular symptom at a time and try to treat that rather than trying to treat the whole disorder in one go. This study proposes to develop and test a mobile app version of a new therapy for paranoia called CBM-pa. CBM-pa is a self-administered psychological therapy that has been developed by combining basic research on biases in paranoia with established techniques that can change these biases. CBM-pa is computerised and involves reading text that could be interpreted in a paranoid way (such as the stare of a stranger which could reflect harmful intentions). The therapy encourages readers to make the alternative interpretation (such as the stare reflecting harmless curiosity) by using word tasks and questions. A six-session version has been developed and a feasibility study has been completed with promising results. In year 1 of this study we will develop CBM-pa into a more accessible and engaging 12- session app for mobile phones, called STOP: Successful Treatment of Paranoia, by adding 6 newly created sessions. In years 2-4 we will give patients STOP alongside their usual treatment and compare this with a control condition where patients simply read text in the mobile app instead. The study uses a randomised controlled design and patients are recruited from two different UK sites. Participants will receive either 6 or 12 sessions of STOP and we will measure clinical symptoms immediately and at 3 and 6 months later. These treatment data will be compared with data from similar people who take part in a control condition (reading text in the app) and are assessed at the same times. The data will show us whether there are any beneficial effects of STOP and, if so, how long they last. We will also measure in more detail exactly how many sessions produce enough symptom reduction to be clinically useful.