Better Nights/Better Days: Improving Psychosocial Health Outcomes in Children with Behavioural Insomnia

Up to 25% of children suffer from sleep problems that are referred to as 'behavioural insomnia'; that is, they have difficulty settling, falling asleep, and staying asleep. This leads to inappropriate daytime sleepiness and negatively effects behaviour, mood, and school performance. It also has negative effects on parents' sleep and their daytime functioning. Although there are methods for treating these problems, few children receive these treatments, and many get inappropriate treatments like medications. Only about 1% of children with insomnia are treated with the behavioural approaches that have been shown to work. The main reasons for this are that most parents are unaware of what the right treatments are, and most health care providers they contact do not have the training to provide these treatments. The Better Nights/Better Days Pediatric Sleep Team will address these barriers by developing, putting in place, and testing the usefulness of a sleep treatment program for children aged 1-10 years with behavioural insomnia that will be delivered over the internet, with added telephone support. This approach will make the treatment program available to the majority of parents whose children have insomnia. We will test whether parents make good use of this program and whether it is effective in improving sleep among children. We will also study whether improved sleep results in better daytime functioning for children and for the sleep and functioning of parents. We will provide information to health care providers on how to use this treatment program. This approach will help ensure that the program will continue after the proposed research study ends. The proposed research program will therefore address an important public health issue by creating new knowledge and by turning this knowledge into a better way of delivering health care, thereby improving the health and well-being of Canadian children and parents.