According to an article recently published in MedPage Today, nearly three quarters of surveyed physicians wrote prescriptions for sleep medication as their primary course of insomnia treatment – even though many treatment guidelines recommend nonpharmacologic interventions (such as cognitive therapy, stress reduction therapy and sleep hygiene education) first.
We weren’t too surprised to read just how popular drugs are with doctors as a first course of treatment – however we were shocked to read that only 2% of the physicians ordered non-pharmaceutical interventions as their primary treatment.
We know that for some, drugs are essential if they are to get any sleep. However, we also know that many insomniacs find relief from natural alternatives and benefit from further research into the root cause of their insomnia. This is often more valuable than taking drugs – but involves more work and effort.
We need to stop our over-reliance on prescription medication as a primary treatment option for insomnia. Perhaps we need more sleep specialists for doctors to refer insomniacs to. Maybe more insomniacs need to speak up and demand there be more insomnia research and more respect for what they go through. This is exactly what we’re trying to achieve – please join us.
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I think it’s the *doctors* who need to stop initial over-reliance on prescription meds. From what I’ve heard, my particular issues don’t seem to have a currently available sleep med.
It would also help if, when you said “Sleep meds/benzodiazepines don’t work on me”, that the Dr. would *listen* and not go right ahead and try a different one than any you might mention, because after all, you don’t know what you’re talking about, unless you’re a doctor yourself.
Have you tried visiting a different doctor, or a sleep specialist? Why do you think doctors are so keen to prescribe medication?
Oh, I’ve fired a few. The only time I got a sleep study finally authorized, I was in a patch of fairly normal sleep, so of course nothing showed–and I’d told that to the dr before the test ran. He was’t believing me much before, either. I haven’t tried for another sleep study since–the ones I hear about are for apneacs, which I’m not. Maybe I should ask my endocrinologist to sugget something/someone.
I’m close enough to Standord & Dr Dement to take one there, but it’d have to be timed right, and I’m not having large patches of insomnia right now. It’s more occasionally, or for a week or so. Not going to stand up to future scheduling very well.
It’s easier to try medication first, and many patients seem to want that.
That’s the issue with sleep studies – they tend to be short term, whereas insomnia is a long term affliction. Of course, a long term sleep study would be prohibitively expensive.
Perhaps we need a way of administering scientific and accurate ‘at home’ sleep studies.
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