Publications by authors named "Azucena Garcia Palacios"

Article Synopsis
  • Family members of individuals with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) often struggle with mental health issues like depression and anxiety, leading to a significant burden.
  • Family Connections (FC) is an effective program designed for these relatives, and this study aimed to compare its impact against standard treatment in a Spanish population through a randomized clinical trial.
  • Although no major statistical differences were found between FC and the usual treatment, results indicated that FC led to improved outcomes in burden, stress, and quality of life for both family members and patients, highlighting the value of involving families in treatment for psychological disorders.
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Article Synopsis
  • The article discusses a case study of a 31-year-old woman, Paula, who has both Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (EDNOS) and underwent a year-long Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) treatment.
  • DBT is a therapeutic method that helps individuals regulate emotions and includes a mix of behavioral change strategies, validation, and acceptance while addressing eating disorders as a means of emotional regulation.
  • After completing 12 months of DBT, Paula showed significant improvement, no longer meeting the criteria for BPD, and experienced a notable decrease in emotional regulation difficulties and EDNOS symptoms.
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  • Researchers wanted to find better ways to help young people avoid mental health problems, especially depression.
  • They tested three different apps: one that helps build emotional skills, one based on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and one for keeping track of feelings.
  • The study included 1,262 young people from several countries, and they checked how the apps helped reduce depression symptoms after three months.
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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates the effectiveness of three different self-help apps aimed at improving mental wellbeing among young people, specifically comparing a personalised emotional competence app, a cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) app, and a self-monitoring app.
  • Conducted as a randomised controlled trial across four countries, the research involved 2532 young participants aged 16-22 without major depression, who were monitored for 12 months to assess changes in mental wellbeing.
  • The primary measurement for evaluating success was the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well Being Scale (WEMWBS) at a 3-month follow-up, ensuring that the outcomes were objectively assessed by unaware evaluators.
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Introduction: Emotional disorders (ED) (mood and anxiety disorders) are very prevalent and disabling, and often appear in comorbid presentations. Although there are effective treatments for these disorders, there is still a large gap between the number of people who need them and those who actually receive them. The combination of three strategies may help in this regard, facilitating the dissemination and accessibility of treatment: the transdiagnostic perspective of ED, the group format, and the use of technologies in a blended format (i.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study examined how changes in processes targeted by Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Behavioral Activation Therapy for Depression (BATD) relate to changes in pain intensity and mood in patients with chronic low back pain and depression.
  • Using data from 82 patients, the research highlighted individual variations in how therapy outcomes combined with psychological processes affected patients, regardless of the treatment group they were in.
  • The results indicate that tailoring psychological therapies to individual needs may enhance treatment effectiveness for those suffering from both chronic pain and depressive symptoms.
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The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of an online psychological intervention for individuals with gambling-related problems, supported by ecological momentary assessments and interventions (EMAs and EMIs), along with weekly phone-calls, before conducting a randomized controlled trial. Participants were required to complete 3 of the 8 modules of the program based on cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and extensions and innovations of CBT. The study measured the outcomes of feasibility (i.

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Background: Depressive disorder and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) are prevalent in primary care (PC). Pharmacological treatment, despite controversy, is commonly chosen due to resource limitations and difficulties in accessing face-to-face interventions. Depression significantly impacts various aspects of a person's life, affecting adherence to medical prescriptions and glycemic control and leading to future complications and increased health care costs.

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Background: Depression is already the leading psychological disability around the world, impairing daily life, well-being, and social functioning and leading to personal and social costs. Despite the effectiveness of Evidence-Based Psychological Practices (EBPP), a significant percentage of depressive individuals remain untreated, especially in Primary Care (PC) settings in Spain. There are numerous barriers that limit access to EBPPs, including high costs, professional training, and adherence problems.

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Presurgical anxiety is very common and is often treated with sedatives. Minimizing or avoiding sedation reduces the risk of sedation-related adverse events. Reducing sedation can increase early cognitive recovery and reduce time to discharge after surgery.

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Article Synopsis
  • Depression is a widespread mental health issue with significant societal and economic costs, and while traditional treatments exist, many people struggle to access them.
  • Evidence suggests that smartphone-based interventions, particularly games that incorporate Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) principles, could be effective alternatives for those with mild to moderate depressive symptoms.
  • This pilot study will randomly assign 40 participants to either the smartphone game intervention or a waiting list control group to assess the effectiveness of this approach over two months, measuring various outcomes related to mental health and engagement.
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The use of a foreign language has been introduced in the clinical setting as a form of emotional distance to help deal with negative experiences. However, the evidence of foreign language reducing emotionality during processing negative events is still scarce. This study aims to test whether the description and processing of a traumatic or highly emotional event in a foreign language could modulate the strength of the connection between traumatic symptomatology and emotional reaction.

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Gambling is becoming increasingly frequent and problematic, especially due to the explosion of online alternatives. Evaluating the severity of gambling symptomatology is therefore more important than ever. However, innovations in the gambling field have generally focused on its treatment rather than its evaluation.

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Introduction: Psychotherapies delivered the Internet have been promoted as an alternative for improving access to psychological treatments. A conceptual working alliance model of blended (i.e.

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Over the past 20 years, there has been a significant reduction in the incidence of adverse events associated with sedation outside of the operating room. Non-pharmacologic techniques are increasingly being used as peri-operative adjuncts to facilitate and promote anxiolysis, analgesia and sedation, and to reduce adverse events. This narrative review will briefly explore the emerging role of immersive reality in the peri-procedural care of surgical patients.

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Background: Using a foreign language can influence emotion modulation, but whether different psychotherapy processes would be affected by a foreign language is still unclear. The current study explored the foreign language effect on the extinction of fear.

Method: During the conditioning phase, part of the neutral stimuli presented to the participants were associated with a threat, while they performed a countdown task in their native language.

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Introduction: Emotional disorders are the most frequent mental health problems globally. To ensure the dissemination of psychological treatments for these conditions, novel forms of delivery (e.g.

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Background: Depression affects millions of people all over the world and implies a great socioeconomic burden. Despite there are different effective evidence-based interventions for treating depression, only a small proportion of these patients receives an appropriate treatment. In this regard, information and communication technologies (ICTs) can be used with therapeutic aims and this can contribute to make interventions more accessible.

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The prevalence of emotional disorders has increased in recent times. Emotional Reasoning (ER), which is a transdiagnostic process, occurs when feelings, rather than objective evidence, are used as a source of information to make judgements about the valence of a situation. Differences in ER may explain the existence and maintenance of emotional disorders.

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Background: Transdiagnostic internet-delivered cognitive behavioral therapy (iCBT) for emotional disorders has been shown to be effective in specialized care in the short term. However, less is known about its long-term effects in this specific setting. In addition, predictors of long-term effectiveness may help to identify what treatments are more suitable for certain individuals.

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