Does adjunctive family therapy enhance recovery from bipolar I mood episodes?

Background: Family therapy is sometimes used as adjunctive treatment to pharmacotherapy to help patients recover from mood episodes of bipolar I disorder. However, the efficacy of this practice is not known. Methods: Ninety-two patients meeting criteria for a current bipolar I mood episode were randomly assigned to family therapy plus pharmacotherapy, multifamily psychoeducational group therapy plus pharmacotherapy, or pharmacotherapy alone. Time to recovery was analyzed with survival analysis. Results: The proportion of subjects within each treatment group who recovered did not significantly differ, nor did time to recovery. Limitations: The analyses did not include other outcomes such as psychosocial functioning, prophylaxis against recurrences of mood episodes, or compliance with pharmacotherapy. Conclusions: Neither adjunctive family therapy nor adjunctive multifamily psychoeducational group therapy significantly improves the rate of recovery from mood episodes of bipolar I disorder, compared to treatment with pharmacotherapy alone.