Abstract
BackgroundCaring for a person with borderline personality disorder is associated with poor outcomes including elevated psychological distress and burden. This study will compare the effectiveness of two brief psychoeducational programs for carers of youth presenting for early intervention for borderline personality disorder features. The protocol for this study is presented here.MethodsThe study is a single-centre parallel group, randomised controlled trial. As a family unit, relatives, partners and friends (‘carers’) are randomly allocated to one of two treatment arms to receive either an online borderline personality disorder psychoeducation program, or both the online psychoeducation group and a face-to-face group program, Making Sense of Borderline Personality Disorder. Carers are assessed at baseline and follow-up (4 weeks after the intervention). It is expected that participants who received the combined group and online programs will have better outcomes than those who received the online program alone. The primary outcome is carer burden, assessed using the negative appraisal subscales of the Experience of Caregiving Inventory. Secondary outcomes include positive experiences of caregiving, coping, self-rated personality disorder knowledge, psychological distress, expressed emotion and quality of life.DiscussionThis will be the first published evaluation of a psychoeducational intervention for carers of youth with borderline personality disorder features using a randomised controlled trial design. The results have the potential to inform clinicians and carers about the effectiveness of brief interventions designed to support families and friends of young people with borderline personality disorder, and what medium those interventions should utilise.Trial registrationProspectively registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trial Registry ACTRN12616000304437 on 08 March 2016.
Highlights
Caring for a person with borderline personality disorder is associated with poor outcomes including elevated psychological distress and burden
It consists of three two-hour sessions facilitated by two specialist youth mental health clinicians; the third session is co-facilitated by a family peer support worker, with lived experience of caring for a mentally-ill young person
If the online program is found to be effective it can be readily applied in clinical practice
Summary
Study design The study is a single-centre parallel group, single-blinded RCT. The study was developed in accordance with Good Clinical Practice (GCP) Guidelines and Standard Protocol Items; Recommendations for Interventional Trials (SPIRIT; [18]). Interventions MS-BPD is a manualised group program designed for carers of young people with BPD features, informed by the principles of CAT It consists of three two-hour sessions facilitated by two specialist youth mental health clinicians; the third session is co-facilitated by a family peer support worker, with lived experience of caring for a mentally-ill young person. The Online program was developed for carers of youth with BPD features It comprises two modules: ‘Introduction to Early Intervention for Borderline Personality Disorder’ and ‘Caring For A Young Person with Borderline Personality Disorder - Information for Families and Friends’. Taking the above factors into account and assuming a correlation of 0.5 between baseline and outcome measures, a total sample of 54 units would have power of 80% to detect a difference of 0.5 standard deviations between the Online and Online+MS-BPD arms This effect size is regarded as a medium size difference
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