Improving sleep & wellbeing in visually impaired people using computational temperature intervention

The feasibility of improving sleep and well-being in visually impaired individuals using a computationally informed temperature intervention.

As many as eighty percent of people with a severe visual impairment (formally known as ‘blind’), report significant problems sleeping. Damage to the retina disrupts the light signal reaching the central circadian clock, dysregulating sleep-wake cycles. Currently, no routine sleep measures are obtained, nor sleep interventions offered, as part of general clinical practice in care for individuals with severe visual impairment. In contrast, the lived experience of visual impairment highlights sleep disturbance as a major cause of distress and daily dysfunction. This project formally unites, for the first time, Dr Michael Crossland (Principal optometrist, Low Vision Clinic Moorfields Eye Hospital and Senior Research Fellow, UCL Institute of Ophthalmology) with Danny Ball, PhD candidate in Computational Modelling for Sleep and Circadian Dysfunction.

At present, no existing therapies to aid sleep in visually impaired people specifically highlight the role of temperature. Thus, this powerful mechanism which could aid sleep dysfunction in visually impaired people is currently overlooked. This project aims to develop and test for feasibility a novel proof-of-principle sleep intervention targeting temperature for visually impaired individuals. 

This project will significantly accelerate the pace and scale of action through a series of PPIE focused groups to devise, for the first time, a sleep-intervention protocol tailored to visually impaired individuals that centres on temperature regulation. This grant involves the development and trialling of this intervention. This project underscores the beginning of a collaboration, uniting UCL expertise, to support future cross-disciplinary large-scale grant applications.

Primary outcomes:

• Development of a PPIE co-produced intervention protocol to aid sleep using temperature in individuals who are visually impaired.
• Feasibility of the intervention (recorded using sleep diaries) and adherence to the intervention (verified using temperature sensors).

Secondary outcomes:

• Change in objective sleep measures and circadian regulation (actigraphy at baseline vs sleep quality during and post intervention) and change in subjective sleep score (Pittsburgh sleep Quality Index and Karolinska Sleepiness Scale). Change in well-being (Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale), anxiety (GAD-7) and Depression (PHQ8).