"Could your patients be missing this key ingredient in their recovery?"
Dear Physiotherapist,
Do you ever wish you could do more for your patients? You know what I mean. Those times when you walk out of the treatment room wishing you could have done a little more.
I’ve had that feeling when I tryied to help my patients with their sleep. Patients were struggling with their sleep and it was impacting their recovery. I wanted to help, but didn’t know how.
Sharing my knowledge around sleep hygiene wasn’t enough and I knew it.
Who do you turn to for your questions about sleep?
Well naturally you turn to Google. Right?
I wanted to help my patient so I started looking for an outcome measure on sleep and stumbled on one. I had him fill it out, but truthfully I didn’t know what to do next. I didn’t know how to decipher the results to have any meaningful discussion with him.
I had similar experiences with other patients and I continued feeling helpless. Everywhere I turned I kept coming up empty. There just wasn’t anything I could find as a rehab professional to help my patients sleep better.
This was the moment that everything changed...
About three years ago I was sitting in a seminar and the clinician was talking about the important role of sleep in persistent pain.
As I was sitting there, I resolved to do something about this knowledge gap in myself and within the physiotherapy profession.
“Sleep research was daunting. And I couldn’t believe what I found…”
I’ll admit I was naive. I mean, how deep could sleep research go? When I started my research, I thought the focus would be on getting the latest research on sleep hygiene rules.
Boy was I wrong! There was this whole world that opened up about sleep treatment strategies that didn’t require drugs, and were more effective in the long-term. And there were studies highlighting how non-psychologists could easily administer this treatment.
Over 200 journal articles & textbooks later!
Sleep research is still in its infancy, but it’s fascinating stuff. The connections that sleep researchers are making with sleep and health is far reaching.
"400 hours later...I've distilled what you need to know..."
Let’s be honest. We don’t have a lot of time. Between seeing patients, charting, family responsibilities, and continuing professional development. Our time is limited.
I don’t know about you, but it’s amazing how even though we have good intentions to read and research more, things just stay in our physical or virtual inbox.
I’ve created something that moves you past information and to action…
But more on that later!
Why Does Sleep Health Matter?
We take sleep for granted.
And it’s easy to assume that our patients have trouble free sleep.
But when you look at the stats of people suffering with disrupted sleep, we’re going to have a number of people on caseload struggling with sleep. And that number goes way up if you’re treating patients struggling with chronic pain conditions such as fibromyalgia, headaches, etc.
The biopsychosocial model has been making more and more inroads into how we look at our treatment strategies, which is great. But funny how sleep health can often be forgotten.
Patients struggling with disrupted sleep are going to have issues with memory and learning, motivation and mood, along with decreased healing and general immunity.
Just think of how you perform after a night of poor, fragmented sleep. Now imagine your patients who may be experiencing multiple nights awake of disrupted sleep.
What if sleep is the missing link?
Even with our best treatment programs and education, patients can still struggle to move and feel better. Often the missing link is sleep health.
Sleep health is increasingly recognized as a FOUNDATION to health and well being. Poor sleep can cause a cascade of problems impacting one’s ability to live free of pain and injury.
From my experience, patients are looking for more than general sleep hygiene tips. And more often than not, this basic knowledge doesn’t translate into any meaningful lifestyle change.
Sleep education is sparse for rehab professionals and especially for physiotherapists. My vision is to create a set of resources that empowers you with the knowledge and tools to help your patients with their sleep health.
Here's how you get up-to-speed on sleep:
Go To Bed: The Clinician’s Handbook for Understanding Sleep
In this 159 page paperback book you’ll get the most important, clinically relevant information on sleep health.
Each chapter brings just the right amount of detail to give you the understanding you need as a clinician…not as a sleep researcher.
In this book, you will gain an understanding of:
- The Impact of Poor Sleep: Understand what happens to the body with disrupted sleep.
- The Sleep-Pain Connection: Discover the powerful connection between sleep and pain and the influence of pain drivers on sleep.
- Tools to Evaluate Sleep: Learn the different clinical outcome measures and tools to evaluate a patient’s sleep health.
- The Physiology of Sleep: Understand the different stages of sleep and the important functions of sleep.
- Insomnia Management: Understand the different approaches used in treating insomnia including pharmacological options, sleep hygiene rules (including their evidence) and other popular complementary medicine alternatives.
- CBT for Insomnia: Explore the components of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for Insomnia — the best supported treatment for insomnia.
BUILT ON EVIDENCE
Providing an evidence-based resource has been the backbone of this project.
In 90 minutes of reading, you can soak in the synthesis of countless sleep textbooks, and over 200 academic journal articles on sleep.
Walk away with the following:
✓ Understand the ways sleep changes as we age and become aware of those most at risk of insomnia.
✓ Come away with four principles that every patient struggling with poor sleep should know.
✓ Uncover the surprising research showing the powerful, bi-directional relationship between sleep and pain.
✓ Become familiar with the most important sleep outcome measures
✓ Know when you should refer a patient for a sleep study.
✓ Become equipped to screen patients at risk for obstructive sleep apnea.
✓ Expand your understanding of different sleep hygiene rules and the evidence for specific rules.
✓Get an understanding of the common sleep supplements that patients use and the evidence for their use.
✓ Become aware with the components of CBT for Insomnia.
✓ And much more!
Check out the Table of Contents:
Ch. 1: When Sleep Goes Wrong
A lot can go wrong with sleep. Explore the effects and health impacts of disrupted sleep on general health, immune function, inflammation, and memory.
Ch. 2: The Impact of Poor Sleep
Understand how insomnia is defined and those most at risk for insomnia. Additional sleep disorders are reviewed as is the connection between sleep and depression.
Ch. 3: Drug Effects & sleep
Understand the effects of various prescription and recreational drugs on sleep.
Ch. 4: Pain & Sleep
Discover the evidence surrounding the complex bi-directional relationship between sleep and pain. A synthesis of the latest research is provided.
Ch. 5: Understanding Sleep Basics
Walk through the basics of the sleep cycle, the functions of sleep and the impact of age. Explore the concepts of sleep drive, circadian rhythm and more.
Ch. 6: Sleep Evaluation
Understand the different outcome measures and objective testing options available for evaluating sleep. Screening for sleep apnea is also covered.
Ch. 7: Insomnia Management
A summary of pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments of insomnia are reviewed. Sleep hygiene rules and non-traditional treatments are provided.
Sleep Resources
Andrew Koppejan, PT Physiotherapist
About the Author
Nearly one-third of our lives are spent sleeping, so when our sleep is disrupted it has immediate effects on our ability to think, act and reason clearly.
Andrew Koppejan, a registered physiotherapist and founder of ignitephysio, an online learning community, has spent the better part of his medical professional life seeking to improve connection and collaboration between medical professionals for the benefit of patients. Certified in GunnIMS, Koppejan regularly works with chronic pain patients and has seen the powerful relationship between sleep and pain.
Through over 170 academic articles, textbooks and popular sleep help books, Koppejan has sought answers to the enigmatic relationship between sleep and health, knowing already that “healthy sleep equals a healthy body,” but missing the “why.”
Rehab professionals are in a unique position to deliver the keys to great sleep health and this book is the perfect concise, practical handbook to do just that.
Interested in previewing a book chapter?
Read the entire first chapter about the impacts of disrupted sleep.
Here what other rehab professionals are saying:
Welcome to Your Sleep Toolkit
What good is information without clinical application?
It needs to be practical because we need to make a difference in the clinic tomorrow.
From the outset, I wanted to make sure that this sleep book was more than another book collecting dust on our shelves. It needed to come with a toolkit to help you integrate your learning into the clinical environment with patients.
I have put together two toolkits to support clinicians and clinics wanting to engage and educate their patients about sleep.
I’m confident that you’ll find these tools extremely helpful in helping you educate your patients about the essential elements of sleep science and sleep health.
5 Steps to Start Incorporating Sleep Health into Practice
This easy-to-read 5 page guide gives you my recommended steps to getting started with sleep health in the clinic. These are the steps I wish I had when starting out on this journey of sleep health.
Key Sleep Screening Questions Cheat Sheet
It's easy to get overwhelmed with questions to start asking your patients. This simple PDF handout gives you the 4 key questions you should be asking your patients about their sleep and gives you visual cues to actually remember the questions to ask.
Understanding Sleep Stages Visual
This full colour visual can be an excellent support tool to help you educate your patients about the stages of sleep. Supporting key points are included for each stage so you're cued as to what to share with patients.
Explain the Basics of the Circadian Rhythm
The circadian rhythm is an important topic to cover with patients. This full colour visual is professionally designed and gives you the key points to highlight about the different elements of the circadian rhythm.
Understanding the Sleep Drive Visual
There are a number of factors that influence the internal drive to sleep. Professionally designed, this graphic highlights the factors that can increase OR decrease the sleep drive and thereby affect sleep efficiency.
An Overview of the Sleep Cycle
Typically the sleep cycle graphs are complicated and hard to understand. We've created a full colour visual that is simple to understand and highlights the key takeaways for explaining the sleep cycle.
The 4 Key Principles for Healthy Sleep Patient Handout
This one page colour visual highlights the key principles that patients should follow when promoting healthy sleep. This can serve as a great handout for patients.
7 Common Mistakes You're Making with Sleep Report (Patient Focus)
Often patients can often engage unknowingly in unhealthy sleep habits. This report gives a summary of 7 common mistakes and how disrupted sleep can be impacting their recovery.
Use this sleep report as a lead magnet for your clinic marketing efforts.
3 Clinic Posters to Support Patient Education
Educate your patients about sleep with visual impact. Educate patients about the sleep stages, 4 key questions to self-assess sleep health and key questions to identify risk of sleep apnea. Handouts and high resolution print-ready PDFs enable you to easily print these posters to a large size (18x24") and display in your clinical environment.
3 Clinic Posters to Promote the Value of Sleep
Begin to introduce sleep conversations into your clinical setting with these beautiful, sleep quote posters. High resolution print-ready PDFs enable you to easily print these posters to a large size (18x24") and display in your clinical environment.
Please note that all of these deliverables will be delivered digitally in PDF format.
More testimonials from rehab clinicians:
