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The impact of an exercise training intervention on cortisol levels and post-traumatic stress disorder in juveniles from an Ugandan refugee settlement: study protocol for a randomized control trial

Overview of attention for article published in Trials, July 2018
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  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (87th percentile)

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246 Mendeley
Title
The impact of an exercise training intervention on cortisol levels and post-traumatic stress disorder in juveniles from an Ugandan refugee settlement: study protocol for a randomized control trial
Published in
Trials, July 2018
DOI 10.1186/s13063-018-2753-x
Pubmed ID
Authors

Henning Budde, Davin P. Akko, Herbert E. Ainamani, Eric Murillo-Rodríguez, Roland Weierstall

Abstract

Latest research demonstrates a significant improvement in stress-related symptoms in psychological disorders as a result of exercise training (ET). Controlled clinical trials further validate the significance of ET by demonstrating lower salivary cortisol levels in patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after intervention. A significant change in cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) levels can already be found after an 8-12-week ET program. The proposed study aims to investigate the impact of an 8-week ET on PTSD symptoms and changes in cortisol levels in a juvenile refugee sample from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) at an Ugandan refugee settlement. It is the first to implement an ET intervention in a resource-poor, post-conflict setting. In a randomized controlled trial, 198 adolescent participants aged 13-16 years from the DRC who, suffer from PTSD, will be investigated. The participants are based at the Nakivale refugee settlement, an official refugee camp in Uganda, Africa, which is among the largest in the world. The participants will be randomized into an Exercise Training (ET) group with a maximum heart rate (HRmax) of > 60%, an Alternative Intervention (AI) group with low-level exercises, and a Waiting-list Control (WC) group. After the 8-week interventional phase, changes in cortisol awakening response (CAR) and DHEA in the ET group that correspond to an improvement in PTSD symptoms are expected that remain at follow-up after 3 months. To date, there is no controlled and reliable longitudinal study examining the effects of an ET program on symptom severity in individuals with PTSD that can be explained with a harmonization of cortisol secretion. The presented study design introduces an intervention that can be implemented with little expenditure. It aims to provide a promising low-threshold and cost-effective treatment approach for the application in resource-poor settings. German Trials Register, ID: DRKS00014280 . Registered prospectively on 15 March 2018.

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Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 246 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 246 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 32 13%
Student > Bachelor 30 12%
Researcher 26 11%
Student > Ph. D. Student 25 10%
Student > Doctoral Student 10 4%
Other 32 13%
Unknown 91 37%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Medicine and Dentistry 30 12%
Psychology 28 11%
Nursing and Health Professions 24 10%
Social Sciences 18 7%
Sports and Recreations 10 4%
Other 37 15%
Unknown 99 40%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 18. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 17 September 2018.
All research outputs
#2,139,088
of 25,988,468 outputs
Outputs from Trials
#234
of 1,868 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#41,977
of 342,319 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Trials
#1
of 2 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,988,468 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 91st percentile: it's in the top 10% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 1,868 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a little more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 7.4. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 99% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 342,319 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 87% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 2 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has scored higher than all of them