Lauren Asarnow, Ph.D.

Fellow In Access To Care

Project Details

PROJECT TITLE

Improving Access to Care: Testing an Integrated Care Mobile Health Intervention to Improve Sleep and Mental Health in Adolescents

PROJECT SUMMARY

Sleep problems among adolescents are at epidemic levels and are associated with severe mental health problems. Access to existing effective and safe behavioral sleep treatments is poor and often nonexistent. This study aims to improve access to behavioral sleep interventions through primary care, a setting where most youths have access to care, with the overall aim of improving mental health. Major barriers to youth receiving referrals to behavioral sleep interventions from primary care providers include low availability of qualified providers, long wait times, and perceptions of treatment as stigmatizing, geographically inconvenient, and often necessitating missed school. We propose to develop and evaluate an innovative treatment delivery strategy to improve access to effective behavioral sleep interventions and reduces access barriers. The proposed strategy will help meet the needs of the large numbers of youth with sleep health problems. It will do so by 1) integrating the intervention within primary care; and 2) using mobile and electronic health technologies that can be used at users’ own pace and space, with a personalized text support. Specifically, we propose to adapt and evaluate a sleep intervention with demonstrated efficacy for improving sleep and mental health outcomes in youth, for online and mobile device delivery. To enhance the impact of the mHealth intervention, we will focus on youth from low-income communities, a population with higher prevalence of sleep problems and low access to services.

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