This week, Bobbi Conner talks with Dr. Joshua Tutek about cognitive behavioral therapy to treat insomnia. Dr. Tutek is a licensed clinical psychologist in the Division of Sleep, Mood, Anxiety Research and Treatment at MUSC.
TRANSCRIPT:
Conner: I'm Bobbi Conner for South Carolina Public Radio with Health Focus here at the radio studio for the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. The gold standard treatment for helping patients sleep better is a type of talk therapy called cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia. Doctor Joshua Tutek is here to provide the details. Doctor Tutek is a licensed clinical psychologist in the MUSC Division of Sleep, Mood, Anxiety Research and Treatment. Doctor Tutek, give us a brief overview of what cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia is.
Dr. Tutek: Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia is a treatment paradigm. It usually takes about 6 to 10 sessions. It is a talk therapy, so it's completely verbal. There's no medication involved. And it's basically working with a person to change their habits around sleep and their sleep schedules in a way that the scientific evidence would suggest is conducive to getting better sleep.
Conner: Well, explain or give examples of how this therapy helps an individual identify and replace some of those thoughts and behaviors that either cause or maybe worsen their sleep habits.
Dr. Tutek: One conception that a lot of patients have when they first come in is that they need to spend more time in bed in order to get adequate sleep. And so oftentimes, they'll end up spending an extra hour, half an hour in bed to try to ensure that they have enough time to get enough sleep. But unfortunately, they often just end up spending that time wide awake. And so, we actually find is that that makes things worse over time. And so, we ask them to restrict their time in bed a little bit in order to build up the body's natural hunger for sleep, so that they'll be able to sleep in a more consolidated manner throughout the night.
Conner: And do you focus on how much sleep that individual person needs?
Dr. Tutek: One of the things that we try to work with people on is to recognize that there is natural variation across the human population and also across the lifespan, and everybody has a different amount of sleep that's best for them. And, they might need a little bit less. They might need a little bit more than what we're getting, but we're looking basically to help them feel that their sleep is adequate in order to, you know, do the things that are important to them in their life and their goals.
Conner: And how do patients practice at home what they've learned in their individual therapy sessions?
Dr. Tutek: One thing we typically ask patients to do in our sessions is come up with a sleep schedule, and we do that based on information that they come in with using something called sleep diaries, which they fill out for us on a day by day basis. We give them a custom tailored sleep schedule. And so, we ask them to stick to that. That means getting out of bed, waking up at the same time each day, and having a specific designated bedtime or sleep time.
Conner: What other key points do you help people focus on in general, just to promote a good sleep routine?
Dr. Tutek: One thing might be coming up with what we sometimes call a buffer zone. This is a space of time to relax at night and sort of wind down from your day, because a lot of people go into sleep with a lot of stress from all the things that they have going on during the day. And, they carry that momentum into the bed. So, we ask people to come up with like a cushion of time before they actually get into bed and try to fall asleep. And so a lot of CBT-I is actually just putting the sleep schedule into practice and then allowing nature to take its course, so to speak. You know, getting the natural processes where they need to be and then not worrying about it.
Conner: Doctor Tutek, thanks for talking with us about cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia.
Dr. Tutek: Thank you for having me.
Conner: From the radio studio for the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, I'm Bobbi Conner for South Carolina Public Radio.
Health Focus transcripts are intended to accurately represent the original audio version of the program; however, some discrepancies or inaccuracies may exist. The audio format serves as the official record of Health Focus programming.
