Tourette syndrome - a neurological disorder characterized by involuntary tics such as blinking, head-jerking and loud sounds - can be devastating for children, setting them up for teasing and ostracism, while the drugs used to treat the condition have significant side effects.
Now a study has found that behavioral therapy may help lessen tics in children and teens about as effectively as medication.
In the study, released Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, 126 children age 9 to 17 who had Tourette or a chronic tic disorder were randomly assigned to 10 weeks of a behavioral therapy designed to reduce ticking, or to a control group that received support therapy and education.
About one-third of all children were also on anti-tic medication. The study treatment also included a functional intervention to better manage anxiety-producing social situations.
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Some participants in the therapy group received "booster" treatments at three and six months after the 10-week therapy sessions.
At the end of the study, about 53 percent of the children in the therapy group were judged significantly improved, compared with 19 percent of the children in the control group.
At six months, 87 percent of the children who completed therapy and had not dropped out of the study still showed benefits.
The therapy group's results were about the same as recent studies examining the effectiveness of medication, the study authors said. These drugs include antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications as well as antipsychotics such as risperidone and haloperidol. Some have side effects such as weight gain and lethargy.
The therapy, called comprehensive behavioral intervention for tics, has several elements. The key one, habit-reversal training, helps a person become more aware of the urge to tic, then teaches them to engage in a voluntary behavior - rhythmic breathing, perhaps - that competes with the tic. Though the therapy doesn't suppress the urge to tic, it channels the urge into another, less noticeable behavior.
