ACUTE AND ONE-YEAR OUTCOME OF A RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL OF BRIEF COGNITIVE THERAPY FOR MAJOR DEPRESSIVE DISORDER IN PRIMARY-CARE

Background The consensus statement on the treatment of depression (Pay kel & Priest, 1992) advocates the use of cognitive therapy techniques as an adjunct to medication. Method This paper describes a randomised controlled trial of brief cognitive therapy (BCT) plus 'treatment as u sual' versus treatment as usual in the management of 48 patients with major de press ive disorder presenting in primary care. Results At the end of the acute phase, significantly more subjects (P < 0.05) met re covery criteria in the intervention group (n=15) compared with the con trol group (n=8). When initial neuroticism scores were controlled for, reductions in Beck Depression inventory and Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression scores favoured the BCT group throughout the 12 months of follow-up. Conclusions BCT may be beneficial, but given the time const raints, therapists need to be more rather than less skilled in cogniti ve therapy. This, plus methodological limitations, leads us to advise caution before applying this approach more widely In primary care.