Insomnia can be like a bad habit, in that the longer you let it continue, the tougher it is to change (which is what happens when acute insomnia becomes chronic insomnia). Whether you’ve recently started a new job, moved, or had any other major life changesĪnd remember, the sooner you tell your doctor about sleep problems, the easier they tend to be to address.Where you sleep and what your sleep environment looks like.Any feelings of anxiousness, stress, or worry when you can’t sleep.Whether your weekend and weeknight sleep schedules are different.Your typical sleep routine (including daytime naps, if you take them).What your sleep troubles look like, when you experience them, and how often.If you have sleep problems, here are some topics you may want to bring up with your doctor, according to the National Sleep Foundation: For instance, if there’s an unidentified underlying medical condition, say, arthritis, that’s contributing to your insomnia, any amount of behavioral therapy you do may be futile if no one’s addressing the chronic pain keeping you awake at night. One critical component of diagnosing insomnia is accurately and comprehensively measuring the problems the condition is causing so that all of those symptoms can be addressed in a treatment plan. Using all of these tools gives doctors a picture of the factors affecting your sleep and helps them determine if there might be an underlying psychological or medical problem behind your sleep trouble that needs to be addressed, or what type of help you need. A sleep study (an overnight sleep test in a lab that lets a doctor objectively evaluate your sleep).Blood tests (which help the doctor rule out underlying medical conditions).A sleep inventory (a more extensive questionnaire about your sleep habits, medical history, and personal health).A sleep log (a diary you keep to track the details of your sleep over several days, weeks, or months).Tools that can be helpful in measuring insomnia symptoms include: ( 2) Instead, your primary care provider or a sleep specialist will use a variety of tools to evaluate your symptoms and determine the best treatment approach. There’s No One Test for InsomniaĬurrently, there is no specific diagnostic test for insomnia. You can find a sleep specialist in your area by visiting the Society for Behavioral Sleep Medicine or the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. If your symptoms require even further assistance, your doctor will recommend a sleep specialist, Nowakowski says. In some cases, a simple conversation about good sleep habits and how you can incorporate them into your life will be enough to make the changes you need to sleep better. “Your doctor may be able to explore coexisting or contributing conditions to insomnia - like anxiety, depression, or sleep apnea - and help you manage it,” Tsai says.

So if you do have trouble sleeping, bring it up. While some family physicians and other primary care doctors are starting to ask about how much sleep you’re getting (much like when they ask if you smoke or drink), some do not address it with their patients, Dr. Tsai says. “If you’re having any issues with sleep, you need to bring it up with your doctor,” says Sheila Tsai, MD, a pulmonologist and the section head of sleep medicine at National Jewish Health in Denver. Your family physician is a good place to start. If you start experiencing interruptions to sleep on a regular basis, it’s time to loop in your doctor. Individuals with chronic insomnia may not even be aware that they’re not sleeping, Dr. Nowakowski says. Its official definition means sleep woes that occur at least three nights a week for a period of three months. While acute insomnia is short-lived, usually ending after whatever triggered the disruption in sleep disappears, chronic insomnia can linger for weeks or months, even years.

Concerns or frustration about your sleep.

Problems focusing, concentrating, or paying attention.

But it’s likely that sleep problems at night will also cause some daytime symptoms, too. If you have insomnia, you’ll experience one of those symptoms.

You wake up earlier in the morning than you anticipated.

You wake up in the middle of the night and can’t fall back to sleep within 30 minutes.

Lying awake for 30 minutes or longer once you get into bed should raise a red flag. Insomnia, which you might have after just one night of bad sleep, involves any one of these three main characteristics or symptoms, explains Sara Nowakowski, PhD, a clinical psychologist and sleep researcher at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.

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