“There’s a gap in services for people with depression who haven’t got better through NHS Talking Therapies,” said Professor Barney Dunn of the University of Exeter. “These people often don’t qualify for further specialist mental health care, and so are left with no further options. We’ve shown that offering MBCT to this group can be effective and cost-efficient to deliver, and we hope this will lead to it being implemented widely. We need investment in this and other areas where there are gaps in service, to ultimately save the NHS money.”
The trial’s cost-effectiveness analysis revealed strong results. Professor Barbara Barret, from King’s College London, said: “We are highly encouraged by our findings, which reveal that MBCT treatment offers a powerful dual benefit for this group: superior patient outcomes coupled with notable cost savings for the NHS.”
Discussing why the therapy works so well, Professor Clara Strauss of the University of Sussex noted:
“It helps people to recognise negative, self-critical thoughts as thoughts, rather than as facts and so helps to lessen their emotional impact. It helps people to be more accepting of their difficult experiences and to be kinder to themselves. MBCT also helps people to avoid getting stuck in unhelpful, repeated cycles of negative thinking. Encouragingly, our trial shows MBCT can even work for people where other forms of talking therapy have had little effect.”
Offering a broader perspective, Professor Kevin Munro, Director of NIHR’s Research for Patient Benefit Programme, commented: “This NIHR-funded study shows that mindfulness-based therapy has the potential to benefit patients with difficult-to-treat depression, as well as the NHS and the wider economy. It’s a great example of practical research that could quickly help improve people’s quality of life.”
