Influence of Valproic Acid on Extinction-based Therapy in Patients With Fear of Spiders.

• Status: Completed
• Trial end date: 2018-06-30
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: All

Summary

The purpose of this study is to evaluate whether valproic acid in combination with fear memory reactivation is useful to enhance treatment stability of exposure therapy for specific phobia.

• Phase: Phase 2
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Details

• Lead Sponsor: Prof. Dominique de Quervain, MD
• Treatments: Valproic Acid

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• DSM-IV diagnosis of specific phobia (animal type: spider)

• BAT score (at screening) between 1 and 7 points

• Physically healthy

• Normotensive (90/60-140/90 mmHg)

• Male or female

• Aged between 18 and 40 years

• Native or fluent German-speaking

• Females have to be on effective birth control

Exclusion Criteria:

• Other axis I disorder except a further comorbid phobic disorder

• Concurrent psychotherapy or pharmacotherapy

• Previous exposure-based therapy for specific phobia

• Parallel participation in another study

• Body weight less than 50kg

• Long-term medication intake

• Substance abuse

• 5 or more cigarettes a day and/or inability of being abstinent for at least 5 hours

• Pregnancy or breast-feeding

• Kinetosis

• History of coagulation disease

• History of gastrointestinal disease

• Laboratory exclusion criteria: clinically relevant deviation of laboratory values (blood count, blood chemistry, coagulation status, liver and pancreas enzymes, electrolytes) from normal range