The effect of buddhist psychotherapy on depressive symptom in adjustment disorder caused by physical disease patients

Abstract

Background: Adjustment disorder with depressed mood from physical disease increased the time for disease to be improved. Therefore, an effective treatment is needed. Objective: To study the effect of Buddhist psychotherapy combined with standard treatment on depressive symptom and quality of life in patients with adjustment disorder with depressed mood from physical disease compared with the control group. Material and Method: It was an experimental study. The subjects with age ranged 20 to 70 years old that had Thai Hamilton rating scale for depression >8 scores were divided into two groups of 22 patients each. The experimental group received Buddhist psychotherapy once a week for 30 minutes in addition to the standard treatment whereas the control group obtained only the standard treatment. Both groups were tested with Thai Hamilton rating scale for depression, at baseline and every week for four weeks WHOQOL-BREF-THAI at baseline and after the forth weeks. Compare the results of Buddhist psychotherapy by repeated measure analysis and unpaired t-test. Results: Before treatment, the Thai Hamilton rating scale for depression of both groups were not significantly different (p = 0.826). After the second week of treatment, the Thai Hamilton rating scale for depression of the Buddhist psychotherapy group was significantly decreased compared to the control group (p<0.001), and it continued to decrease in a statistically significant way when compared with repeated measure analysis (F = 9.55, p = 0.004). Consideration of the differences between WHOQOL-BREF-THAI scores (before treatment minus the results at the last treatment sessions), it was found that the Buddhist psychotherapy and control groups had a mean score of 19.27+8.36, and 14.36+7.76, respectively. The results of the unpaired t-test revealed that the Buddhist psychotherapy group had a significantly larger WHOQOL-BREF-THAI score than the control group (p = 0.049). Conclusion: The Buddhist psychotherapy is an intervention that can be used additionally with standard treatment to improve the symptoms of depression and quality of life of adjustment disorder with depressed mood from physical disease. © 2017 Medical Association of Thailand. All rights reserved.