Cognitive behavioral therapy for treatment of chronic primary insomnia: a randomized controlled trial

Use of nonpharmacological behavioral therapy has been suggested for treatment of chronic primary insomnia, but well-blinded, placebo-controlled trials demonstrating effective behavioral therapy for sleep-maintenance insomnia are lacking.

To test the efficacy of a hybrid cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) compared with both a first-generation behavioral treatment and a placebo therapy for treating primary sleep-maintenance insomnia.

Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial conducted at a single academic medical center, with recruitment from January 1995 to July 1997.

Seventy-five adults (n = 35 women; mean age, 55.3 years) with chronic primary sleep-maintenance insomnia (mean duration of symptoms, 13.6 years).

Patients were randomly assigned to receive CBT (sleep education, stimulus control, and time-in-bed restrictions; n = 25), progressive muscle relaxation training (RT; n = 25), or a quasi-desensitization (placebo) treatment (n = 25). Outpatient treatment lasted 6 weeks, with follow-up conducted at 6 months.

Objective (polysomnography) and subjective (sleep log) measures of total sleep time, middle and terminal wake time after sleep onset (WASO), and sleep efficiency; questionnaire measures of global insomnia symptoms, sleep-related self-efficacy, and mood.

Cognitive behavioral therapy produced larger improvements across the majority of outcome measures than did RT or placebo treatment. For example, sleep logs showed that CBT-treated patients achieved an average 54% reduction in their WASO whereas RT-treated and placebo-treated patients, respectively, achieved only 16% and 12% reductions in this measure. Recipients of CBT also showed a greater normalization of sleep and subjective symptoms than did the other groups with an average sleep time of more than 6 hours, middle WASO of 26.6 minutes, and sleep efficiency of 85.1%. In contrast, RT-treated patients continued to report a middle WASO of 43.3 minutes and sleep efficiency of 78.8%.

Our results suggest that CBT represents a viable intervention for primary sleep-maintenance insomnia. This treatment leads to clinically significant sleep improvements within 6 weeks and these improvements appear to endure through 6 months of follow-up.