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Participants needed to help researchers find out how stress is linked to disease

10 October 2014

Do you want to be involved in psychophysiological research studies? Would you like to take part in a randomised controlled trial looking at the effects of medications on the stress-disease link? The Stress Pathways Study has been set up to explore the biological mechanisms that may mediate the pathways linking stress to disease.

Medication

The UCL Psychobiology Group at the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health are recruiting healthy volunteers aged 18-65 to take part in the Stress Pathways Study. Volunteers will be asked to do the following:

  • Come to 1-19 Torrington Place on two separate occasions (day 1 and day 8). The first session will last approximately 45 minutes and the second approximately 3 hours.
  • Fill out some questionnaires, get your full body composition measured, and undergo a low-demand psycho-social and cognitive stress protocol.
  • Provide saliva samples for one day at home and provide blood and saliva samples in the lab.
  • Take study medications once a day for seven days - either propranolol (a beta-blocker), escitalopram (an SSRI), or a placebo.

We are currently recruiting and will continue recruitment until October 2015 - If you are interested in participating in the Stress Pathways Study please email Amy at a.ronaldson@ucl.ac.uk for more information.

On completion of the study, volunteers will receive £50.

This study has been approved by the UCL Research Ethics Committee (Project ID no: 5203/001). All information collected will be treated as strictly confidential and handled in accordance with the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998.