Self-guided psychosocial intervention for facial palsy V1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A pilot study evaluating the effectiveness of information and therapy guides for improving the psychosocial wellbeing of people with facial palsy.
IRAS ID
258778
Contact name
Matthew Hotton
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Joint Research Office
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 9 months, 29 days
Research summary
Facial palsy has been shown to have a significant impact on an individual's psychological wellbeing, including issues with anxiety, depression and low self-esteem. These elevated levels of distress have been thought to be partly due to the impact that facial palsy has on the face’s ability to express emotions, which is a crucial aspect of face-to-face communication.
With this in mind, we have developed seven self-guided information and therapy guides (ITGs), for people with facial palsy and/or their friends or relatives. We have written these guides by drawing on interventions with a strong evidence-base in other populations, such as cognitive behavioural therapy, social skills training and acceptance and commitment therapy:
1)Facial palsy: Coping with the early stages.
2)Facial palsy: Coping with comments, questions and staring.
3)Facial palsy: Communicating with confidence.
4)Facial palsy: Managing anxiety.
5)Facial palsy: Managing your mood.
6)Facial palsy: Building your self-esteem.
7)Facial palsy: Advice for friends, family and partners.We aim to evaluate the effectiveness, usability and acceptability of these guides to people with facial palsy and/or their friends, family and partners, by piloting their use over a 4-6 week period. Assessment of psychosocial wellbeing will be carried out before and after the 4-6 week period, while participants will be invited to provide usability and acceptability feedback on the guides after the 4-6 week period.
REC name
South Central - Oxford B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/SC/0288
Date of REC Opinion
29 Jul 2019
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion