Drug Takes New Approach to Insomnia

A new drug for insomnia helped people get a little more sleep with few side effects, researchers report. Suvorexant acts in a different way than drugs now on the market. It targets the brain chemicals that help keep people awake. Other drugs affect the brain in a broader way. That’s one reason for side effects, such as daytime sleepiness. The new study of suvorexant included 254 healthy adults with insomnia. People were randomly assigned to receive 1 of 4 doses of suvorexant. They took the drug for 4 weeks and placebo (fake) pills for another 4 weeks. They spent the first night of each treatment in a sleep lab. On their first day taking suvorexant, they slept about 5% to 13% longer than those who took the placebo. That equaled about 21 to 37 extra minutes of sleep. The average difference varied with the dose people were taking.