Traditional African Healing Ceremony in a U.S. Population

NCT ID: NCT01873482

Last Updated: 2014-11-03

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Total Enrollment: 17 participants
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2014-05-31

Brief Summary

Pre-agricultural societies almost universally used healing ceremonies that involved reverence, rhythm and dance in the presence of a healer. It is believed that we are "wired" for such experiences and they foster an integrative mode of consciousness similar to that of mindfulness based stress reduction, which has been shown to have therapeutic effects in a variety of conditions. Collaborator Ava Lavonne Vinesett of the Duke Dance Program has developed a healing ceremony based in sub-Saharan African traditions. The investigators plan is to have 25 subjects with a variety of clinical conditions participate in this ceremony. Subjects will then be asked to write a commentary about their experience and to participate in a focus group discussion. It is anticipated that the study will give us some idea of how promising this approach would be and what kinds of patients might benefit. Safety issues are minimal and include the possibility of injury (though the dancing is not strenuous) and psychological distress.

Conditions

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome; Anxiety; Depression; Cancer

Study Design

• Allocation Method: NA
• Intervention Model: SINGLE_GROUP
• Primary Study Purpose: SUPPORTIVE_CARE
• Blinding Strategy: NONE

Study Groups

Movement with rhythm

Subjects will move for 1 hour in time to the Congolese rhythm called Zebola.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Movement to rhythm

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Movement to rhythm

Interventions

Movement to rhythm

Movement to rhythm

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Age 25 to 65 with one of the diagnoses listed above or with 8 visits to their provider in the last year and with no diagnosis of chronic illness.

Exclusion Criteria

• physical disability making participation difficult and previous experience with a similar ceremony, for instance while growing up in Africa.

• Minimum Eligible Age: 25 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 65 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Duke University

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

Kenneth Wilson, MD

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Duke University

Locations

Duke University

Durham, North Carolina, United States

Countries

United States

Other Identifiers

Pro00042492

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id