Treatment Youth With Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

• Status: Unknown status
• Trial end date: 2010-12-01
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

Although research suggests that patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) exhibit specific deficits in their high cognitive processes, it is still unknown how these deficits relate to the clinical symptoms of the disorder, and to the response to treatment. There are two aims for the proposed research. The first is to examine how high cognitive processes and brain activity are affected in OCD. The second aim is to investigate the effects of a specific psychotropic medication (escitalopram) on high cognitive processes and brain activity in OCD. We will investigate how 40 youth with OCD (recruited in specialized clinics) differ from 40 healthy youth (recruited from the local community) on selected cognitive tests and brain imaging paradigms, as well as explore how treatment with medication can correct or reverse the observed differences. The final goal of our research is to learn more about the mechanisms of action for available treatments, in order to refine and improve short- and long-term therapeutic strategies for a highly debilitating and often lifelong disorder.

• Phase: Phase 4
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Details

• Lead Sponsor: University of Ottawa
• Collaborator: H. Lundbeck A/S
• Treatments: Citalopram; Dexetimide

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• Be 13 to 19 years old

• Have at least average intellectual ability

• Currently meet DSM-IV-TR criteria for OCD, upon completion of the Anxiety Disorder Interview Schedule for DSM-IV - Research and Lifetime Version for child and parent (ADIS- RLV)

• Receive a total score equal to or greater than 20 on the CY-BOCS at the screening visit have less than 25% decrease on the CY-BOCS total score between the screening and baseline visit

• If female of childbearing potential and sexually active in a heterosexual relationship, the subject must be using a reliable method of contraception, such as hormonal contraceptives

• Oral contraceptives must have been started at least 3 months prior to the start of the study

Exclusion Criteria:

• Clinically significant and/or unstable medical condition, including cardiovascular, respiratory, hematological, neurological and endocrine diseases

• History of neurological disorder or head injury

• Current use of medication with central nervous system effects

• Substance abuse or dependence within 6 months prior to enrolment

• Contra-indication to the fMRI

• Color blindness

• A comorbid current DSM-IV Axis I diagnosis, except for tic disorders and another anxiety disorder, as long as the associated disorder is less disabling than the primary diagnosis of OCD, as can be assessed with the ADIS

• Patients who would require additional psychological or pharmacological treatment

• Significant suicide risk, based on clinical judgment and the relevant section of the ADIS

• Hypersensitivity to escitalopram

• Previous non-response to an adequate trial of escitalopram

• Any lifetime psychiatric disorder as assessed on the ADIS

• A lifetime diagnosis of schizophrenia in biological parents or siblings