Pear Therapeutics announced today the availability of its prescription digital therapeutic for chronic insomnia in adults over the age of 22, called Somryst.

Somryst uses cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBTi) to train the brain and body to sleep. Over the course of the patient’s program, the therapy guides them through lessons and challenges, including algorithm-driven sleep restriction, to help teach the patient ways to improve their sleep.

The therapy is designed to be an end-to-end virtual experience, starting with a remote evaluation to determine if an individual would make a good candidate for Somryst. Once a prescription is obtained, a caseworker from PearConnect – Pear’s patient service center for its digital therapeutics – leads the patient through the initial setup process.

WHY THIS MATTERS

Somryst has been found to drive better sleep outcomes in a series of studies.

In one study, clinical researchers from Pear conducted a randomized controlled trial of 1,149 Australian adults with insomnia and depressive symptoms. Results indicated that the intervention reduced the amount of time it took to fall asleep by 45%, reduced the amount of time spent awake at night by 52% and reduced the severity of insomnia symptoms by 45%, with continued improvement at six and 12 months post-treatment.

The other study reviewed the user journeys of 151 patients who dropped out of a prior randomized controlled trial conducted using the early version of Somryst to determine predictors of intervention dropout. These included the length of time it took patients to complete a treatment core, the volume of email support messages and the time to get out of bed once awake at baseline.

These results are meaningful because insomnia has a worldwide prevalence of between 10% and 30%, according to a report from the Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care. It is most common in older adults, females, and people with poor medical and mental health. Insomnia can lead to consequences such as depression, impaired work performance, work-related or motor-vehicle accidents, and overall poor quality of life.

Rates of insomnia have only gotten worse since the start of the pandemic, according to a study from the Elsevier Public Health Emergency Collection. The study compared rates of insomnia among adults living in China before and during the COVID-19 pandemic and saw a 37% increase in the rates of clinical insomnia.

THE LARGER TREND

Back in 2019, Pear announced Somryst would be the first to put the FDA’s Pre-Cert pilot program through its paces. It received market authorization from the FDA in March of this year.

Big Health has an insomnia treatment of its own called Sleepio, which was recently found to improve not only sleep but also symptoms of depression.

Others in the sleep improvement space are OmniPEMF, with its neurostimulation headband called NeoRhythm. The headband uses pulsed electromagnetic field (PEMF) technology to help wearers create the desired mental state for sleep, relaxation, focus, pain relief, meditation or energy.

ON THE RECORD

“We’re excited to offer patients who have been struggling to find a long-term solution for chronic insomnia with a meaningful, first-line treatment that is accessible via an end-to-end care model, to support patients and healthcare providers during the virtual onboarding process,” said Corey McCann, the president and CEO of Pear Therapeutics, in a statement.

“The availability of Somryst demonstrates our ongoing commitment to developing PDTs to deliver easily accessible treatment options to patients for their chronic conditions, important now more than ever as we continue to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic.”

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