Grant: Pro. Gr. - PA: Pandemic Preparedness and Health Emergencies: ECI Grant

Exposure to traumatic events can result in the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a common, serious, and complex mental health condition. Undoubtedly, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a traumatic experience for many healthcare workers worldwide. Indeed, the prevalence rate of PTSD has risen to devastating heights among healthcare workers as a result of the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Critically, however, approximately 40% of individuals have been shown to be treatment-resistant to currently available interventions for PTSD. In the current study, frontline healthcare workers with PTSD will self-regulate brain networks that are directly associated with their symptoms using a non-invasive technique called neurofeedback. Here, brain activity will be processed in real-time with neuroimaging technology. Brain network connectivity values will then be displayed visually to individuals while they attempt to gain control over this signal. Preliminary evidence suggests that training with neurofeedback from localized brain areas can result in therapeutic effects. However, mechanistic evidence for regulating brain networks in PTSD has not previously been demonstrated. Importantly, it is hypothesized that targeting disrupted brain networks associated with PTSD symptoms may result in more optimized clinical effects. Using network-based neurofeedback, the proposed study will examine i) the underlying neural mechanisms, and ii) the individual differences in clinical profiles and demographic factors, that are associated with successful brain network training among healthcare workers affected by PTSD. This single-session mechanistic study has the potential to directly inform future clinical trials examining network-based neurofeedback as a novel treatment for PTSD. This study parallels the urgent Canadian societal need to decrease the impact of trauma-related mental illness and to develop novel treatments for those suffering from PTSD.