| Summary: | Objective: To examine the treatment outcome of an intensive trauma-focused treatment program for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in older and younger adults. Methods: A non-randomized outcome study was conducted with 62 consecutively admitted older PTSD patients (60–78 years) and 62 younger PTSD patients (19–58 years), matched on gender and availability of follow-up data. Patients participated in an intensive eight-day trauma-focused treatment program consisting of eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), prolonged exposure (PE), physical activity, and group psycho-education. PTSD symptom severity (Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale-5 (CAPS-5)) was assessed, at pre- and post-treatment, and for a subsample (<i>n </i>=<i> </i>31 older; <i>n </i>=<i> </i>31 younger patients) at six-month follow-up. Results: A repeated-measures ANCOVA (centered CAPS pre-treatment score as covariate) indicated a significant decrease in CAPS-5-scores from pre- to post-treatment for the total sample (partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup><i> </i>=<i> </i>0.808). The treatment outcome was not significantly different across age groups (partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup><i> </i>= 0.002<i>). </i>There were no significant differences in treatment response across age groups for the follow-up subsample (pre- to post-treatment partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup> < 0.001; post-treatment to follow-up<i> </i>partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup><i> </i>= 0.006), and the large decrease in CAPS-5 scores from pre- to post-treatment (partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup><i> </i>= 0.76) was maintained at follow-up (partial <i>η</i><sup>2</sup><i> </i>= 0.003). Conclusion: The results suggest that intensive trauma-focused treatment is applicable for older adults with PTSD with a large within-effect size comparable to younger participants. Further research on age-related features is needed to examine whether these results can be replicated in the oldest-old (>80).
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