The app has received an official recommendation from the UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE provides national guidance and advice to improve health and social care in England); however, at present, it is only available in Australia via a Flinders University clinical trial.
Sleepio the Therapeutic App
Sleepio the new app is deemed to be a safe and effective treatment for people suffering from insomnia and could reduce the number of prescriptions for medications such as zolpidem and zopiclone, which can become addictive as per the NICE report.
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This calls for all the general practitioners (GPs) and people with insomnia in Australia to learn the accessibility of the app.
“Our previous research has shown that Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for insomnia (or ‘CBTi’) is the most effective treatment for insomnia and Sleepio is a self-administered version of that,” says Dr. Alexander Sweetman from Flinders University’s Adelaide Institute for Sleep Health.
Cognitive behavioral therapy targets the underlying psychological, physiological, and behavioral causes of insomnia, in contrast to medications, which simply treat the symptoms.
Need for Better Counterparts
Almost 45 GPs are reported to have participated in the Australian Sleepio trial currently with 200 patients being to Sleepio.
The team aims to continue the trial throughout 2022 and further develop the pathway within the doctors’ central software program which may help the GPs in identifying and referring the patients to the specialized digital cognitive behavioral therapy program for insomnia.
“So far, patients have reported improved insomnia symptoms and around a 40% reduction in sleeping pill use,” says Dr. Sweetman.
Source: Medindia
