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CompletedNCT06955780EFTUpdated May 2, 2025

Emotional Freedom Techniques on Burnout in Therapists

An interventional study of Emotional Freedom Techniques in Burnout, Anxiety and Distress, Emotional, sponsored by University of Indianapolis. Completed at 1 site in United States. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2025-05-02.

Sponsored by University of Indianapolis · Not applicable, Interventional, and Treatment

From the registry’s dates

  • Registered 1 year 6 months after the study started (first participant enrolled Oct 2023, registered Apr 2025).
Phase
Not applicable
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
18
Allocation
Not applicable
Ages
18 Years and older
Sex
All
01

Study summary

The goal of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of Emotional Freedome Techniques (EFT) on burnout in rehabilitation therapists. The main question[s] it aims to answer [is/are]:

  1. Does a single session of EFT reduce burnout in therapists immediately and/or one month later as measured by the short version of the Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT-S)?
  2. Does a single session of EFT reduce Subjective Units of Distress (SUDS) data related to burnout in therapists immediately and/or one month later?
  3. Do clinicians with more years of experience have overall lower levels of burnout as measured by the BAT-S?
  4. Are there significant differences in the level of burnout amongst occupational or physical therapists?

Participants will:

  • Complete the demographic survey using the Qualtrics link. Information pertaining to age, gender, years of work experience, professional discipline, workplace setting, etc. will be gathered.
  • Complete a short 12-item questionnaire (Burnout Assessment Tool - Short [BAT-S]) that immediately follows the demographic questions. Questions will be related to experiencing feelings of burnout.
  • Attend a free, live, virtual wellness session. Before the session begins, you will be asked to privately answer three questions related to current levels of work distress, despair, and anxiety using a Qualtrics link. During the wellness session, the research team consisting of the PI and student researchers will describe what Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is and how it is performed. The research team will then lead participants through EFT with you performing the technique on yourself.
  • Immediately following the session, you will be asked to privately answer the three questions relating to work distress, despair, and anxiety again using a Qualtrics link.
  • One month after completing the session, you will receive an email containing a Qualtrics link to answer the work distress, despair, and anxiety questions again, as well as the BAT-S in order for the researchers to collect follow-up data.
Read the detailed description

Healthcare employees experience various difficulties, and burnout is one of the most pressing issues in the field (Bridgeman et al., 2018; Knox et al., 2018). Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT), commonly called "tapping," is an emerging psychophysiological intervention that combines elements from cognitive therapy, exposure therapy, and acupressure (Church, 2019; Church et al., 2022). The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of EFT on burnout in rehabilitation therapists. Participants will be members of the American Society of Hand Therapists (ASHT) who are actively employed as occupational therapy or physical therapy practitioners. To recruit participants, researchers will complete the ASHT research division's application for participant recruitment. If the application is denied, researchers will recruit participants through social media. Participants will attend a free, one-hour live virtual wellness session held on a virtual meeting platform. If they choose to participate in the study, they will be directed to a Qualtrics survey to complete the informed consent, demographics, and the Burnout Assessment Tool. During the session, the researchers will guide participants through EFT, collecting Subjective Units of Distress Scale (SUDS) and expanded SUDS data immediately prior to and following the intervention. Additionally, researchers will collect follow-up data using the BAT-S, SUDS, and expanded SUDS questions one month later. Researchers will perform descriptive statistics to analyze demographic data and use SPSS with appropriate statistical tests to explore relationships between the BAT-S, SUDS, and expanded SUDS data from the pre, post, and follow-up data.

02

Conditions studied

  • Burnout
  • Anxiety
  • Distress, Emotional

Keywords

  • burnout
  • emotional freedom techniques
  • EFT
  • occupational therapy
  • distress
03

In context

Burnout, Psychological

467 studies on the registry are indexed under Burnout, Psychological; 121 are open to participants now.

This study's enrollment of 18 is below the median of 80 across 343 interventional studies indexed under Burnout, Psychological.

Browse Burnout, Psychological studies →

Lead sponsor

University of Indianapolis is the lead sponsor of 12 studies on the registry; none are open to participants now.

Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.

04

Who can participate

Ages eligible
18 Years and older
Sexes eligible
All
Accepts healthy volunteers
Yes

Eligibility criteria

Inclusion Criteria: (a) the ability to read and speak English, (b) 18 years of age or older, and (c) actively working in direct patient care.

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Exclusion criteria consisted of individuals who were not practicing therapists, such as managers, therapy aides, or technicians. Following initial recruitment efforts, the researchers were invited to conduct the virtual EFT session for therapy employees of a private practice. Due to this, the researchers expanded the inclusion criteria to include speech therapists employed at this facility. All other inclusion and exclusion criteria remained the same.
05

Study design

Phase
Not applicable
Primary purpose
Treatment
Allocation
Not applicable
Intervention model
Single group
Masking
None (open label)
Enrollment
18 participants (actual)

Interventions

  • OtherEmotional Freedom Techniques

    Emotional Freedom Techniques

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. Subjective Units of Distress

    The SUDS is a rating scale used with EFT to measure individuals' current subjective units of distress. The scale ranges from 0 to 10, with 0 being no distress and 10 being the highest level of distress (Church, 2019).

    Time frame: before, immediately after, and at the one-month follow-up of the EFT session

  2. Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT)

    The BAT is a self-report, Likert-scale questionnaire used to measure burnout. The developers divided burnout into four core scales: exhaustion, mental distance, cognitive impairment, and emotional impairment.

    Time frame: before EFT session and at the one-month follow-up

07

Study locations

1 site
  • University of Indianapolis
    Indianapolis, Indiana 46227, United States
08

References and documents

Publications

  • Church D, Stapleton P, Vasudevan A, O'Keefe T. Clinical EFT as an evidence-based practice for the treatment of psychological and physiological conditions: A systematic review. Front Psychol. 2022 Nov 10;13:951451. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.951451. eCollection 2022. PubMed 36438382 ↗
  • Church, D. (2019). The EFT Manual (4th ed.) Energy Psychology Press.

Individual participant data

Plan to share: Yes — Only IPD used in the results publication

Supporting information: Study protocol, Informed consent form

Time frame: Start date (now) until 1/1/2032

Access criteria: Upon request

09

Timeline

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
ElapsedEstimatedEstimated, not yet reachedSimilar studies: half by the dot; the band is the middle halfHalf of similar studies reached it by the dot; the band is the middle half, from a quarter to three quarters

Ran from Oct 2023 to primary completion in Feb 2024, 3 months.

Of 253 non-industry interventional studies with no phase under Burnout, Psychological, half reached primary completion within 12 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 5 and three quarters within 24. This study's 3 months is below that.

Counting every sponsor, half of 260 studies reached it within 12 months; a quarter within 5 and three quarters within 24.

How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.

Registered
Apr 24, 2025
First posted
May 2, 2025
StartActual
Oct 22, 2023
Primary completionActual
Feb 10, 2024
CompletionActual
Apr 21, 2025
Last update
May 2, 2025
What these dates mean
Start.
When the first participant enrolled; while estimated, when the study expects to open to recruitment.
Primary completion.
When the last participant was examined or treated to collect data for the study's main question, its primary outcome. A study that stopped early gives the date its data collection stopped.
Completion.
When the last participant's last visit took place, for every outcome, secondary ones and side effects included: the end of the study. Often later than primary completion, sometimes the same day.
Actual and Est.
Actual means the registry says the date has happened. Est. (estimated) is a date the sponsor plans or expects. It can still move, and the sponsor is expected to change it to actual once it has passed.
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on May 2, 2025, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
10

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT06955780
Lead sponsor
University of Indianapolis
Responsible party
Erin Peterson DHSc (Assistant Professor of Practice, University of Indianapolis) — Principal investigator
First posted
May 2, 2025
Start date
Oct 22, 2023
Primary completion
Feb 10, 2024
Completion
Apr 21, 2025
Last update
May 2, 2025

Oversight

Data monitoring committee
No
FDA-regulated drug
No
FDA-regulated device
No
View the source record on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗

Not currently enrolling

This study is completed, as verified in Apr 2025. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.

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