Sleep troubles -- including insomnia and disturbed sleep -- are a
common side effect of cancer and cancer treatment, affecting as many as
59 percent of patients. But a new study shows that cognitive behavioral
therapy and mindfulness-based stress reduction are effective at
decreasing symptoms of insomnia in these people.
The strategies also seemed to improve mood and stress levels in the
patients, reported researchers from the University of Pennsylvania
Perelman School of Medicine.
"That MBSR [mindfulness-based stress reduction] can produce similar improvements to CBT-I [cognitive
behavioral therapy for insomnia] and that both groups can effectively
reduce stress and mood disturbance expands the available treatment
options for insomnia in cancer patients," study researcher Sheila
Garland, Ph.D., who is a clinical psychology post-doctoral fellow at the
university's Abramson Cancer Center in Integrative Oncology and
Behavioral Sleep Medicine, said in a statement.
"This study suggests that we should not apply a 'one size fits all
model' to the treatment of insomnia and emphasizes the need to
individualize treatment based on patient characteristics and
preferences," she added.
The study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology,
included 111 cancer patients in Canada. Forty-seven of them were
assigned to undergo eight weeks of cognitive behavioral therapy for
insomnia,and 64 were assigned to undergo eight weeks of
mindfulness-based stress reduction.
Three months after the eight-week treatments, researchers followed up
with the patients to see if their sleep had improved at all. They found
that both groups experienced increases in the amount of time they spent
asleep at night, as well as decreases in the time it took to fall
asleep at the beginning of the night or return to sleep after waking up
in the middle of the night.
Both treatment types decrease insomnia severity, though researchers
noted that the mindfulness group experienced more gradual improvements,
compared with the CBT group, which experienced more rapid improvements.
Reference: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/14/mindfulness-sleep-cancer-patients-cbt-stress-insomnia_n_4576608.html
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