Episode 597: Insomnia – hours of sleep is not the goal!

Best Science Medicine Podcast - BS without the BS

In episode 597, James and Mike invite David Gardner to talk in depth about the issue of insomnia. We talk about triggers, precipitating factors, acute and chronic insomnia, and chronic use of sleeping pills. We discuss Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I) and how his team has developed a comprehensive website, Sleepwell, that provides patients and clinicians with great tools and recommendations for the self-care of chronic insomnia. Mike stays awake for the whole podcast and James only has a brief nap.

Show Notes

Sleepwell, a research and knowledge translation program based out of Dalhousie University in Halifax, includes tools, resources, and recommendations for patients, the public, and health care professionals.

Visit https://mysleepwell.ca/

Some features and resources to explore are:
Sleepwell stories (patient and health care professional video and written accounts)
Clinicians – short videos on how to use get what you need from the website for patient care, and CBT-I training options
Sleepwell recommends – vetted reviews and recommendations for self-help CBT-I programs
Sleeping pills – content to motivate and facilitate safely ending long-term use of sedatives
Tools – sleep diary, online sleep calculator (with guidance for time-in-bed restriction therapy), behaviour change tools (CBTi vs. Sleeping Pills)