Innovations in wearable technology for correcting circadian misalignment in shift work disorder
2021 Strategic Research Grant
Philip Cheng, PhD
Henry Ford Healthy System
Key Project Outcomes
This work is the first to show a widely available consumer-based wearable (Apple Watch) can deliver personalized treatment for Shift Work Sleep Disorder that is tailored to individual circadian timing. More specifically, we show Apple Watch data can estimate underlying circadian timing with comparable performance to gold standard dim light melatonin onset. Using these predictions, we developed personalized light exposure schedules. Compared to control (non-personalized) treatment, personalized light schedules were more likely to produce circadian alignment and resulted in larger phase shifts. Personalized treatment also resulted in less severe Shift Work Sleep Disorder symptoms, including insomnia symptoms, compared to non-personalized treatment.
Taken together, a personalized light intervention informed by data from consumer wearables offers a low-cost, accessible and effective behavioral treatment developed for night shift workers. By testing the implementation of precision sleep medicine into real-world settings, this work represents a meaningful step toward closing the care gap for shift workers, a group with disproportionately high rates of sleep problems and disproportionately low access to sleep health care.
Meeting Abstracts
SLEEP
Are we failing our night shift workers?: A look into the unmet needs of our night shift work force
Using Apple Watch to predict circadian phase in night shift workers