Stephanie McCrory, Megan Crawford, Kenneth MacMahon, Carey Ross, Dipalika Mohanty, Dinaish Mistry, Anastasia Thalia Fulton Chadwick, Leanne Fleming

Insomnia is prevalent in adolescents with co-morbid mental health problems but is often overlooked due to limited access to training for practitioners in the assessment and treatment of insomnia. Whilst Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is the recommended treatment for insomnia in adults (CBTi), there are no standard treatment guidelines for adolescents and limited research with adolescents with co-morbid mental health problems. Therefore, our aim was to develop a CBTi intervention for adolescents with co-morbid mental health problems.

Stephanie McCrory, Megan Crawford, Carey Ross, Dipalika Mohanty, Dinaish Mistry, Kai Chadwick, Leanne Fleming

Insufficient sleep is highly prevalent in adolescents and there is high comorbidity between insomnia and mental health.1 Due to a lack of awareness, training and access to effective interventions, sleep issues are rarely addressed in clinical practice, including Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS).2 The Strathclyde intervention to encourage good sleep health for teenagers (SIESTA) was developed as a school-based programme featuring Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques. An initial feasibility study found that it was feasible, acceptable and effective for improving insomnia and stress.3 However, SIESTA was designed for delivery to all adolescents, irrespective of the presence of sleep difficulties, therefore, some evidence-based CBT-I techniques were excluded. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the appropriateness, and necessary adaptations required, to ensure SIESTA is suitable for delivery to adolescents attending CAMHS.