Strategies for developing sleep research

Abstract

The Australasian Sleep Association (ASA) is seeking to develop a strategic research plan to improve the sleep health of Australians and New Zealanders, and to contribute to scientific understanding and clinical practice worldwide. To develop the plan, the ASA Research Committee undertook two projects: (i) a membership survey to establish the research activities, interests, and priorities of members; and (ii) compilation of an electronic library of citations of sleep-related research that involved one or more Australia-based or New Zealand-based researchers. Although the intent had been to develop an investigator-initiated research agenda for the ASA, these two projects revealed that such an approach would not provide a comprehensive and systematic research base to improve sleep health in Australasia. In particular, membership research interests were considered insufficient to adequately address public health issues relevant to the populations of Australia and New Zealand, clinical research for non-respiratory sleep disorders, and pediatric sleep research. The identification of these gaps raises a tension. If the ASA is to endorse additional research priority areas that are not major interests among its members, then additional research funding needs to be found, to avoid competing with the interests of members for limited existing research funding. To address this problem, a series of recommendations are offered to improve the proportion of existing health research funding that is directed towards sleep research, and to develop sources of new funding for sleep research.