Physical Activity Based Treatment for Youth With Depression and Anxiety

The Confident, Active, and Happy Youth (CAHY) project aims to address the significant functional impairments experienced by youths with symptoms of depression and anxiety, focusing on physical activity (PA) and social participation. Traditional treatments, such as psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy, have shown moderate success, with many patients continuing to face functional and social challenges. This research seeks to fill that gap by testing the effectiveness of a physical activity-based intervention in a clinical setting to improve mental health and functional outcomes in clinical populations. The study will be conducted as a pragmatic, randomized controlled trial, comparing CAHY with a waitlist control group in a real-world clinical setting. The intervention targets disease-specific barriers to PA and social participation, including fatigue, avoidance behaviors and low self-efficacy. The central challenge lies in adapting PA interventions to the clinical needs of youth with psychiatric disorders, which is essential for addressing the social and functional impairments associated with these disorders. If proven effective, the results could have broad applications, offering a non-pharmacological treatment that is scalable and adaptable to various healthcare settings. The intervention supplements current treatment approaches and can improve patient outcomes in the short- and long-term, and can ultimately decrease healthcare service utilization by promoting better self-care and health habits

NCT Number	NCT07304219
Lead Sponsor	Haukeland University Hospital Collaborators: Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, University of Bergen, NORCE Norwegian Research Centre AS
Conditions	Anxiety Depression
Enrollment	100 participants
Start Date	2025-12-15
Primary Completion	2027-07-01 (estimated)
Study Completion	2028-07-01 (estimated)
Updated on ClinicalTrials.gov	2026-01-06