CBT-I, the gold standard insomnia treatment, doesn’t magically turn 6.5 hours of sleep into 8.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT-I) is a psychological intervention that has historically been the go to treatment for people with sleep issues. The treatment involves components such as challenging unhealthy thoughts and beliefs about sleep, restricting non-sleep activities to the bedroom, relaxation techniques, just to name a few. However, most patients who stick through the long treatment period only gain a mere ~10-20min increase in sleep duration.

Before CBT-I, someone may spend 8 hours in bed and sleep 6 of those hours.

After CBT-I, someone may spend 6.5 hours in bed and sleep 6 of those hours.

In both cases, the total sleep time remains the same, but we see an improvement on sleep efficiency, essentially less time lying awake in bed.

Dr. Amelia Scott, a clinical psychologist from the Woolcock Institute recently highlighted, “people end up only getting a little more sleep” after treatment. She has pulled back the veil and and spoken openly about what CBT-I can and cannot help with. In doing so, she brings attention to the sleep industry’s obsession with duration and how, as Dr. Scott puts it, “kicks the recovery can down the road” when we make it the be-all-end-all to one’s sleep problems.

Sleep isn’t about time, it’s about restorative function. This is our brain and body’s ability to execute the processes that are vital for our daily function. This includes flushing out metabolic waste, memory consolidation, supporting our immune system, just to name a few.

We agree that for people who have difficulty falling asleep, CBT-I can help.

But its effectiveness doesn’t change the larger truth. Sleep duration doesn’t magically increase the restorative function of sleep.

So perhaps instead of judging our sleep based on sleep time, we should actually question if our sleep is consistently restorative.

This is the very crux of what we are building here at Affectable Sleep. We’ve spent the last 5 years developing neurotechnology to enhance the restorative function of sleep, without altering sleep time. There is a change coming to the sleep industry, and breaking the over-reliance on sleep duration as the primary lever and measure of sleep quality.

We’ll be revealing more in the coming weeks, as the latest in sleep research challenges how the industry is thinking about the future of sleep, health, and longevity.