Stanford Psychiatry team awarded grant to examine the impact of improving sleep on reducing adolescent suicidality and self-harm

We are excited to announce that Stanford Psychiatry’s Michele Berk, assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, and Rachel Manber, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, have received a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health to examine the feasibility and preliminary effectiveness of augmenting a suicide-focused treatment with an evidence-based treatment protocol for insomnia.

Suicide is the second leading cause of death among 10- to 14-year-olds and the third leading cause of death among 15- to 24-year-olds in the United States. Reducing adolescent suicide rates is an urgent public health imperative. Insomnia — a risk factor for suicidality and suicide deaths in adolescents — is modifiable using brief, evidence-based behavioral treatments. Despite this, insomnia treatments are little studied in combination with suicide-focused treatments in youths.

“This research is relevant to public health because it addresses the urgent need to reduce suicide rates among teens,” say Drs. Berk and Manber.

The project, titled “Combined Dialectical Behavior Therapy and Digital Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia for Adolescents at High Risk for Suicide: A Pilot RCT,” is an initial trial assessing the feasibility and effectiveness of combining evidence-based behavioral treatments for insomnia and suicidality/self-harm as a novel approach to adolescent suicide prevention. The project will use dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) as the suicide-focused treatment and internet-delivered, digital cognitive-behavioral therapy for insomnia (adolescent adapted dCBTI) as the sleep-focused intervention.

“Given the limited success of prior treatment trials and emerging research demonstrating a strong link between insomnia and suicidality, pilot effectiveness research examining the impact of reducing insomnia symptom severity on outcomes of suicide-focused treatments is a critical next step in adolescent suicide prevention research,” say Drs. Berk and Manber. “This will be the first study that we know of to examine the feasibility and preliminary effectiveness of augmenting a suicide-focused treatment (DBT) with an evidence-based treatment protocol for insomnia (dCBTI).”

The focus of Dr. Berk’s career has been on research, teaching, and clinical service in the area of psychotherapy approaches for treating suicidal behavior in adolescents. Recent publications related to Dr. Berk’s work include “Trajectories of Treatment Response and Nonresponse in Youth at High Risk for Suicide,” published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and “Suicide prevention in youth,” published in the journal Child and Adolescent Mental Health.

Dr. Manber has over 30 years of experience treating patients and conducting research to improve non-pharmacological treatments of insomnia. She has led research projects and real-life initiatives to increase patient access to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for insomnia. Recent publications related to Dr. Manber’s work include “Randomized controlled trial of cognitive behavioral therapy for perinatal insomnia: postpartum outcomes” and “Objective sleep duration and response to combined pharmacotherapy and cognitive behavioral insomnia therapy among patients with comorbid depression and insomnia: a report from the TRIAD study,” both published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine.

More Information

For more information about this study, please visit NIH’s RePORTER.