CBIT+TMS R33 Phase

Chronic tics are a disabling neuropsychiatric symptom associated with multiple child-onset mental disorders. Chronic tics affect 1-3% of youth 1 and are associated with impaired functioning, emotional and behavioral problems, physical pain, diminished quality of life, peer victimization, and a fourfold increased risk of suicide compared to the general population. Large randomized trials have demonstrated the superiority of CBIT over supportive therapy in child and adult patients. However, in these trials, only 52% of children and 38% of adults showed clinically meaningful tic improvement, meaning that 50-60% of patients do not benefit from CBIT. CBIT success relies on an ability to suppress tics that many youth lack. The central aim of CBIT is to enhance voluntary tic suppression. Better tic suppression ability drives CBIT improvement 10 and predicts lower tic burden over the course of illness. During the core CBIT procedure, competing response training, patients learn to inhibit tics by engaging in a competing motor action. However, research shows that many youth lack this fundamental tic suppression ability that CBIT aspires to enhance.

This study will examine the clinical and neural effects of a treatment combining Comprehensive Behavioral Intervention for Tics (CBIT) and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to the supplementary motor area (SMA) in young people with tic disorder.