An Effectiveness Study For Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy In The Inpatient With Major Depression

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness in Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy by alleviating the symptoms and improving social function in depressive inpatients and to investigate the important therapeutic factors in Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy, providing experimental evidences for further clinical practice. Methods: 60 inpatients meeting criteria of DSM-â…¥ for Major Depression were randomly assigned to experimental group and control group, 30 cases each. The experimental group received integral intervention including antidepressants and Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy, while the control group received mono-therapy of antidepressants for 12 weeks. Interpersonal problem was identified before the therapy. HAMD, CRS, SDSS were administered at the end of screening day, 8 week and 12 week to both group . At the end of trial , the experimental group completed Group Therapeutic Factors Questionnaire to assess the importance of therapeutic factors in Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy. Result: 1, Interpersonal problem in depressive inpatients showed a significant difference in four interpersonal problems areas (p<0.05). 2, At the end of 12 week, both groups were improved significantly. But the symptom alleviation and social function improving in the experimental group were more significant (p<0.01). 3, The important group therapeutic factors were identified as following: interpersonal gain(M=19.43), interpersonal pay-out(M=19.07), catharsis(M=18.20), self-realization(M=17.80),existential factors(M=17.17), Group cohesiveness(M=16.50), instillation of hope(M=13.60), universality(M= 13.33), imparting information (M=11.63),The corrective recapitulation of the primary family group(M=11.03), altruism(M=10.73), imitative behavior(M=9.97). One-Way ANOVA showed that themean difference was significant (F=25.16, P<0.01).Conclusion: K Among interpersonal problem areas in depressive inpatient, roletransition and interpersonal disputes were the most common . 2n Compared withmono-therapy, integral intervention was more effective in reducing symptoms andimproving social function for depressive inpatients. 3n The most importanttherapeutic factor in Group Interpersonal Psychotherapy was interpersonal learning(gain and pay-out), then were catharsis, self-realization , existential factors andgroup cohesiveness.