Meditation to Reduce Firefighter Distress
For patients and families
In plain language
An automatic summary of structured registry data. It is an orientation aid, not a substitute for the official protocol or a physician assessment.
- What is being studied
- The protocol lists: 10-day meditation intervention, 10-day health education intervention.
- Who it may be relevant to
- Registry conditions: Psychological Distress. Basic parameters: from 18 years · All.
- What needs checking
- Age, condition and sex are only basic indicators. Prior treatment, laboratory values and other mandatory requirements appear in the eligibility criteria below.
- Where it takes place
- United States
- Next step
- Save the trial, show it to the treating physician, and confirm current recruitment with the study center. Costs, documents and travel →
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Official title
Reducing Psychological Distress in Fire Fighters With an Asynchronous App- Based Meditation Intervention
Overview
The more than one million firefighters in the United States provide critical emergency medical services in communities they serve and are on the front lines of healthcare delivery, including in the post-pandemic world. As a result of exposure to occupational stressors, a high proportion of firefighters experience considerable stress-related burden including psychological distress (i.e., increased features of anxiety and depression). To address this need, this project will test the efficacy of a 10-day meditation intervention (i.e., 10 individual prerecorded audio units delivered by smartphone app) among career firefighters to decrease psychological distress (i.e., anxiety and depression).
Detailed description
The goal of this study is to test the efficacy of a 10-day meditation intervention (i.e., 10 individual prerecorded audio units delivered by smartphone app) versus an active attention control (i.e., 10-day health education intervention with 10 individual prerecorded audio units delivered by smartphone app) to reduce psychological distress among N=160 career firefighters (to address possible attrition, N=192 firefighters will be consented and enrolled). The following specific aims will guide the research:
Aim 1. Examine whether firefighters' psychological distress (i.e., features of anxiety \[primary outcome\], depression) is reduced at 10 days, 30 days, and 3 months after the meditation intervention versus an active attention control. Features of anxiety, features of depression will be assessed at baseline (T1), after the 10-day intervention (T2), 30 days later (T3), and 3 months later (T4).
Aim 2: Explore the extent to which reductions in psychological distress from the meditation intervention are mediated by mindfulness and perceived social connection.
Interventions
- Behavioral 10-day meditation intervention
prerecorded meditation units delivered by smartphone app - Behavioral 10-day health education intervention
prerecorded health education units delivered by smartphone app
Primary outcome measures
- anxiety features [Time frame: before, immediately after, 30 days after, and 3 months after the 10-day interventions]
Secondary outcome measures (1)
- depression features [Time frame: before, immediately after, 30 days after, and 3 months after the 10-day interventions]
Eligibility criteria
Inclusion criteria: 1) currently employed as a career firefighter, 2) 18 or older, 3) speak and understand English, and 4) own a smartphone (iPhone or Android) able to download and run the intervention apps.
Exclusionary factors: 1) diagnosis of an illness requiring use of corticosteroids (e.g., asthma), and 2) have ongoing or past regular meditation experience in the last 4 years (i.e. more than two meditation session \[completed or attempted\] per year either with a group or individually), as determined by the PI.
Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.
Healthy volunteers: Yes
Study design
- Allocation
- Randomized
- Model
- Parallel assignment
- Masking
- Open label
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
Study locations
United States · 1 center
- University of Arizona — Tucson
Identifiers
NCT: NCT06518616 · STUDY00003422