External Validity of the Multicomponent Group Treatment KiSS for School-Aged Children With Insomnia

Abstract

ABSTRACTBackground: Insomnia is common in school-aged children and often associated with other mental disorders. Here, we investigated the effectiveness and acceptance of the KiSS program in an “all-comer” pediatric insomnia clinic. Participants/Methods: Forty-five families (children: 5–10 years, 57.8% female) were randomly assigned to the multicomponent six-session KiSS treatment (CBT-I, hypnotherapy, and imaginations) or a wait-list control group. A sleep diary was recorded before intervention or waiting time, immediately after, as well as 3, 6, and 12 months postintervention (primary outcome: sleep efficiency, SE; sleep-onset latency, SOL). Results: Sleep improved significantly after the KiSS intervention. Three to 12 months after the intervention, only 1.75% of treated children still met the diagnostic criteria for insomnia. SE improved to 96%, and both SOL (reduced to 23 min) and total sleep time were normalized. All improvements were stable for at least one year after the intervention. KiSS was well accepted (0% dropout during intervention) and well tolerated. Conclusions: Treatment with the multimodal sleep training KiSS leads to positive changes in the sleep of children with insomnia, including a subset of children that presented with comorbid mental disorders. With only three sessions for parents and three sessions for children, the treatment can be readily implemented as a stand-alone treatment or be combined with other interventions. Dismantling studies and studies with an active control group are ongoing.