Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Generalized Anxiety Disorder in Older Adults: a Preliminary Report

Overview

Journal Behav Ther

Publisher Elsevier

Specialties Pharmacology
Psychiatry
Social Sciences

Date 2011 Feb 5

PMID 21292059

Citations 31

Authors

Julie Loebach Wetherell

Niloofar Afari

Catherine R Ayers

Jill A Stoddard

Joshua Ruberg

John T Sorrell

Lin Liu

Andrew J Petkus

Steven R Thorp

Alexander Kraft

Thomas L Patterson

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Some evidence suggests that acceptance-based approaches such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) may be well-suited to geriatric generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). The primary goal of this project was to determine whether ACT was feasible for this population. Seven older primary-care patients with GAD received 12 individual sessions of ACT; another 9 were treated with cognitive-behavioral therapy. No patients dropped out of ACT, and worry and depression improved. Findings suggest that ACT may warrant a large-scale investigation with anxious older adults.

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