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Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Emotion Regulation Therapy

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Zautra et al. (2003) examined emotion regulation intervention against cognitive-behavioural therapy and a control condition. Patients with rheumatoid arthritis were provided with mindfullness and emotion regulation therapy (teaching skills to increase awareness, acceptance, and management of negative emotions, CBT for pain management, or health education (for control). Results showed that CBT outperformed mindfulness, but emotion regulation improved pain control, especially for patients with a history of major depressive disorder. Relative to other treatment conditions, emotion regulation showed decreased negative affect, increased positive affect and increased pain coping efficacy.
Some studies demonstrated emotion regulation intervention through expressive writing. The patients were to complete 3-5 brief writing sessions, where they were required to express their deepest thoughts and feelings about a traumatic or stressful experience. The investigations showed large benefits to the physical and psychological health of these patients. Another potential benefit in expressive writing is its low cost and easy implementation.
Zuatra et al. (2003) suggest that it is unclear whether emotion regulation interventions are more beneficial than CBT. Difficulty in managing strong emotional states may be an impediment to benefit from standardized CBT. Combining emotion regulation and CBT therapy may confer the maximum benefit.
Recent evidence show that emotion regulation
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