Behavioral Treatment and Memantine in Body Focused Repetitive Behaviors

• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Trial end date: 2024-06-01
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

The goal of the proposed study is to compare the efficacy of behavioral treatment (BT) to memantine, a psychopharmacological agent, for BFRBs. 28 subjects with trichotillomania (TTM) or skin picking disorder (SPD) will receive 8 weeks of memantine treatment, followed by 8 weeks of comprehensive behavioral therapy (ComB) treatment. The hypothesis to be tested is that behavioral therapy will be associated with superior clinical outcomes as compared to memantine. A second hypothesis is that both memantine and behavioral therapy will demonstrate improvement from baseline to the respective posttreatment assessment.

• Phase: Phase 2/Phase 3
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: No

Details

• Lead Sponsor: University of Chicago
• Treatments: Memantine

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• Men and women ages 18+

• Current DSM-5 diagnosis of trichotillomania (TTM) or skin picking disorder (SPD)

• Ability to understand and sign the consent form

• Stable dose of medications for at least the past 3 months

Exclusion Criteria:

• Unstable medical illness based on history or clinically significant abnormalities on baseline physical examination

• Current pregnancy or lactation, or inadequate contraception in women of childbearing potential

• Subjects considered an immediate suicide risk based on the Columbia Suicide Severity rating Scale (C-SSRS)

• Past 12-month DSM-5 diagnosis of psychosis, bipolar disorder, mania, or a substance or alcohol use disorder

• Illegal substance use based on urine toxicology screening

• Previous treatment with memantine

• Previous trial of ComB or similar BT protocol (e,g., habit reversal training)

• Cognitive impairment that interferes with the capacity to understand and self-administer medication or provide written informed consent