Short and Long-Term Effectiveness of Existing Insomnia Therapies for Patients Undergoing Hemodialysis

Most HD patients have significant impairments in quality of life, largely from the high frequency of disabling symptoms. Insomnia is one of the most frequently reported symptoms and studies of HD patients and/or other populations suggest that it is a significant contributor to other common symptoms and poor health outcomes. There are unique contributors to chronic insomnia in HD patients and these include the biologic effects of residual uremia after partial correction as is achieved with current dialysis technology, maladaptation to treatment schedules, and patients' napping during treatments. There is a compelling need to identify effective treatments for insomnia in HD patients and the interventions being studied in this clinical trial, telehealth cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) and trazodone, have a strong scientific premise. If telehealth (web-based) CBT-I is effective for insomnia in HD patients, it will make a treatment that is presently inaccessible available to patients. Trazodone is widely used but the data on efficacy for insomnia are limited; no such data exist for HD patients. SLEEP-HD is a parallel group randomized controlled trial wherein 125 HD patients with chronic insomnia, treated in community-based dialysis facilities in Seattle and Albuquerque, will be randomized 1:1:1 over 31 months to 6-week treatment with telehealth CBT-I, trazodone, or medication placebo.