Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Clinical Trials

The investigators want to learn more about how human beings learn not to fear and the impact of changing the fear network in the brain using transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) in individuals with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). The investigators hope this study will help us understand how future treatments can help patients with OCD better control unwanted fear. Read Less

The proposed study is designed to first test whether teaching people personalized or standardized emotion regulation skills leads to greater decreases in daily negative emotion intensity. Second, using data from an initial sample, the investigators will prospectively assign an independent sample of participants to receive their predicted optimal or non-optimal skills to determine if it is feasible and efficacious to match participants to the most appropriate training condition. Results of these studies may identify the mechanisms by which emotion regulation interventions impact emotional functioning and allow for the development of personalized, evidence-based, and scalable emotion regulation interventions. Read Less

This study investigates whether the commonly used and well-tolerated inhaled anesthetic nitrous oxide can rapidly improve symptoms of OCD. Read Less

This study investigates whether caloric vestibular stimulation can modulate a measure of insight in obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders. Read Less

Anxiety disorders are the most common form of psychopathology, and frequently begin in childhood, resulting in lifelong impairment. Increased brain activity after making mistakes, as reflected by the error-related negativity (ERN), is observed in people with anxiety disorders, even before disorder onset. The ERN is therefore of great interest as a potentially modifiable risk factor for anxiety. However, methodological issues can make the ERN difficult to measure. Increased brain activity in response to a balance disturbance, as reflected by the balance N1, resembles the ERN, but does not share its methodological issues. The investigators' preliminary data demonstrate that the balance N1 and the ERN are associated in amplitude in adults, suggesting they may depend on the same brain processes. The balance N1 has never been investigated in individuals with anxiety disorders, but it increases in amplitude within individuals under anxiety-inducing environmental contexts. Further, balance and anxiety are related in terms of brain anatomy, daily behavior, disorder presentation, and response to treatment. The present investigation will measure the ERN and the balance N1 in children (ages 9-12) with anxiety disorders, and further, how these brain activity measures change in response to a brief, 45-minute, computerized psychosocial intervention that was developed to reduce reactivity to errors, and has been shown to reduce the ERN. The investigators will recruit approximately 80 children with anxiety disorders, half of whom will be randomly assigned to the active intervention condition. The other half will be assigned to an active control condition, consisting of a different 45-minute computerized presentation. Participants assigned to the control condition can access the computerized intervention after participation in the study. The purpose of this investigation is to test the hypothesis that the balance N1 and the ERN will be reduced to a similar extent after the intervention, to demonstrate that these brain responses arise from shared brain processes. Transfer of the effect of the psycho-social intervention to the balance N1 would provide insight into prior work demonstrating that balance training can alleviate anxiety in young children, and well-documented benefits of psychotherapy to balance disorders. Collectively, these data may guide the development of multidisciplinary interventions for the prevention and treatment of anxiety disorders in children. Read Less

A number of studies from the literature suggest important behavioral, psychosocial, or radiologic changes occur following significant neurologic events or interventions such as stroke, neurosurgery, medications, radiation, systemic therapy, or injury. The purpose of this study is to describe these changes with advanced neurologic imaging and targeted neurologic and neuropsychiatric assessments. This is a non-interventional observational study of minimal risk to participants as there is no medical intervention. The results of this study will be used to inform patients, scientists, and society in the development of future treatments. Read Less

The primary aim of the present study is to examine the efficacy and safety of tolcapone in adults with moderate to severe OCD. Read Less

The investigators are conducting this study to learn more about the cognitive and attentional processes among individuals with three types of repetitive negative thinking (RNT): mental rituals (as seen in obsessive compulsive disorder, OCD), worries (as seen in generalized anxiety disorder, GAD), and ruminations (as seen in major depressive disorder, MDD). Specifically, the investigators are studying whether psychological treatment can help people with RNT who have trouble stopping unwanted thoughts and shifting their attention. Read Less

The investigators propose to synchronize automated measurements of behavior - head, body, and face dynamics, gaze, and vocal prosody - with simultaneous recordings of brain activity in clinically relevant contexts. Read Less

This research study is to investigate the safety, feasibility, and possible therapeutic benefits of a technology called Low Intensity Focused Ultrasound (LIFU) in patients with obsessive- compulsive disorder (OCD). The device used in this study transmits high frequency sound waves to a particular region of the brain called the Ventral Striatum (VS). LIFU is a non-invasive form of stimulation, which can be used to stimulate deep regions of the brain. In this study, the investigators will administer LIFU to activate the VS area of the brain while also observing this brain stimulation with an MRI machine. Other aims of this study include learning more about the patterns of brain activity associated with OCD and seeing if brain activity changes as symptoms of OCD change over time during the two weeks of LIFU stimulation. Participants in this study will be asked to perform computer administered behavioral tasks -- similar to simple computer games -- to examine whether certain features of OCD (e.g., avoidance of feared triggers) change over the course of LIFU stimulation. The treatment phase of this research study is expected to last two weeks with three weekly (total of 6) treatment sessions all carried at the MRI brain imaging center at Baylor College of Medicine. There will be at least one additional screening visit before treatment starts and a series of follow up visits over a six-month period. Read Less

This research aims to collect comprehensive data on the clinical trial experience of OCD patients. Its goal is to identify the factors that limit patients' ability to join or complete a trial successfully. Clinical trial participation often favors specific demographic groups, and limited research exists on the impact of trial attributes on participation. Therefore, this study aims to analyze data from various demographic groups and identify any recurring trends that could provide valuable insights for future OCD patients. Read Less

The goal of this clinical trial is to discover brain-based subtypes of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and examine treatment response to two different repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) targets in the brain: the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) and the right prefrontal cortex (rPFC). Read Less