Compassion Meditation vs. Health Education for Veterans
CompletedPhase 2NCT04651296
View the official record on ClinicalTrials.gov Recruiting status changes often. Contact the study team listed on ClinicalTrials.gov, and talk to your doctor before joining a study.
This study has no listed site in Canada in this snapshot. It is included as part of the worldwide chronic pain corpus.
Brief summary (from the registry)
Chronic pain (CP) is a major health problem for military Veterans, and CP is often associated with comorbid mental health problems, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. CP with psychological comorbidity is associated with increased healthcare costs, medication use, risk of suicide and rates of disability and reduced quality of life. Current empirically supported treatments do not always lead to substantial improvements (up to 50% of patients drop out or are do not respond to treatment). This project was designed to evaluate the efficacy of a novel intervention for addressing these challenges. Compassion meditation (CM), a meditative practice that focuses on the wish to remove suffering, is a contemplative practice that has promise for the amelioration of physical and mental health problems as well as promoting positive affect and improving quality of life. This study will evaluate the efficacy of Cognitively-Based Compassion Training for Chronic Pain with Psychological Comorbidity (CBCT-CP+) compared to Health Education while Living with Pain (H.E.L.P.) control condition, in a sample of among Veterans with CP conditions and psychological comorbidity.
Study details
- Official title
- Efficacy of Mind-Body Approaches for the Treatment of Chronic Pain With Psychological Comorbidity
- Conditions
- Chronic Pain
- Stress Disorders, Posttraumatic
- Depression
- Interventions
- Behavioral: compassion meditation
- Behavioral: health education
- Sponsor
- VA Office of Research and Development
- Start date
- 2022-01-04
- Primary completion
- 2025-08-21
- Sex
- All
- Age range
- from 18 Years
- Results posted
- Yes, on ClinicalTrials.gov
- Countries
- United States
- Total sites listed
- 1
Eligibility criteria
Show eligibility criteria (verbatim from the registry)
Inclusion Criteria: Criteria for inclusion include * Veteran status * age 18 or greater * able to consent * pain most days (\> 3 days/week) for at least 6 months * probable diagnosis of depression and/or PTSD Exclusion Criteria: * serious suicidality or homicidality that has required urgent or emergent evaluation or treatment within the past three months or a suicide attempt within the past year * a known, untreated substance abuse or dependence problem (inclusion is possible if there is evidence that the individual has been afforded and is complying with treatment for the substance problem) * untreated/unstable serious mental disorders, such as psychotic disorders or bipolar disorder, or serious dissociative symptoms * cognitive impairment that would interfere with treatment, and * concurrent enrollment in any other treatment specifically targeting chronic pain, anxiety, depression, or PTSD symptoms or social functioning (e.g., couples therapy) or any meditative or mind-body intervention (e.g., mindfulness, yoga)
Source: ClinicalTrials.gov (US National Library of Medicine), snapshot October 2026. Check the registry for current recruiting status. Record: https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04651296