Investigating Clinical Benefits of a Novel Sleep-Focused Mind-Body Program on Gulf War Illness (GWI) Symptoms: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Investigating Clinical Benefits of a Novel Sleep-Focused Mind-Body Program on Gulf War Illness (GWI) Symptoms: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Psychosom Med. 2017 Apr 12;:

Authors: Nakamura Y, Lipschitz DL, Donaldson GW, Kida Y, Williams S, Landward R, Glover D, West G, Tuteja A

Abstract
OBJECTIVE: Mind-Body Bridging (MBB) has been shown to be effective for improving disturbed sleep. In this prospective randomized-controlled trial, we evaluated the efficacy of sleep-focused MBB compared with sleep education control (SED) for improving sleep in previously deployed Gulf War Veterans.
METHODS: US military service members with sleep and physical health complaints who were deployed in 1990-1991 were randomized to receive MBB (n=33) or SED (n=27) between 2012 and 2015, each comprised three weekly sessions. The primary outcome, Medical Outcomes Study-Sleep Scale (MOS-SS) was completed at baseline, weekly during treatment, post-intervention and 3-month follow-up. Secondary outcome measures for PTSD, depression, fatigue, quality of life, symptom severity, and mindfulness were completed at baseline, post-intervention and 3-months follow-up. Salivary samples were collected at five time-points per day at each visit for cortisol and alpha-amylase assessment. Clinician-administered assessments of sleep and co-occurring conditions were conducted at baseline and post-intervention.
RESULTS: MBB was significantly more efficacious than SED in reducing disturbed sleep at follow-up (F(1, 180.54) = 4.04, p=.046). Additionally, self-reported PTSD (F(1, 56.42) = 4.50, p=.038) for the treatment effect, and depression (F(1, 93.70) = 4.44, p=.038) and fatigue symptoms (F(1, 68.58) = 3.90, p=.050) at follow-up, improved in MBB compared with those in SED. Consistently higher percentages of Veterans in MBB reported improvements of sleep, pain and composite sleep/general co-occurring symptoms at the post clinical evaluation, as compared to Veterans in SED. Finally, the mean waking level of salivary alpha-amylase (sAA) in the MBB declined to a greater extent than that in the SED, at follow-up (F(1, 88.99) = 3.78, p=.055), while no effects were found on cortisol.
CONCLUSIONS: Sleep-focused MBB can improve sleep and possibly also co-occurring symptoms in GW Veterans. ;Trial Registration at clinicaltrials.gov: NCT01543997.

PMID: 28406803 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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