Exposure with response prevention versus habit reversal in Tourettes’s syndrome: a controlled study

The intentional nature of tics provides the opportunity to apply behavioural interventions aimed at tic reduction through interruption of stimulus-response sequences. The aim of this study has been to evaluate the effect of exposure and response prevention (ER) versus habit reversal (HR) in 43 Tourette’s syndrome (TS) patients. The three outcome measures were: the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale (YGTSS), 15-min tic frequency registrations monitored at the institute and 15-min home tic frequency registrations. Both treatment conditions resulted in statistically significant improvements on all outcome measures (p<0.0001). No significant differences were found between the treatment conditions on any of the outcome measures, although there was a tendency in favour of ER on the YGTSS (p=0.05). These results suggest that, at least in the short term, TS tic symptoms can be treated effectively with both types of treatment.