Efficacy of Digital Cognitive Behavior Therapy (DCBT) for the Treatment for Symptoms of Depression

Georgia Konstantopoulou; Eleni Mavroeidi

Georgia Konstantopoulou
Eleni Mavroeidi

Keywords: Digital Cognitive Behavior Therapy, dCBT, depression, BDI, HADS, distance therapy

Abstract

For over a decade, digital cognitive behavioral therapy (dCBT) has been available as part of the ubiquitous nature of digital technology, which has rapidly changed our daily lives bringing new approaches to the treatment of many disorders. As the dissemination and the highly structured nature of CBT made it particularly suitable to be delivered digitally as a distance therapy, a wealth of personalized, tailored and automated dCBT programs have been developed, released and investigated, in particular for depression and anxiety, which have shown dCBT to be effective. With the evidence base on the digital communicated form of CBT substantially increasing, the present study aims to investigate the effectiveness of dCBT in improving the symptoms of depression and anxiety. A total of 6 people (3 men, 3 women) were randomly selected to participate in a 12-week therapist-supported dCBT program and we used the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the Hospitality Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) self-completion questionnaire to measure the depression and anxiety levels of the participants before, immediately after the end of the intervention program and a month after the completion of the intervention (follow-up). The results indicated the effectiveness of dCBT for all participants who followed the complete program.

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