SleepCogni to trial its ‘ground breaking’ behavioural treatment for insomnia

SleepCogni has announced it will trial its unique insomnia treatment, following a £575k interim fund raising round, which includes existing shareholders and a new Innovate UK biomedical catalyst award, bringing its total funding to £1.7m to date.

from Left to right, Dr Maan van de Werken, Richard di Benedetto and Richard Mills

Led by chairman and investor Richard di Benedetto, SleepCogni is a medical device that offers a fresh approach to combating insomnia through their patented behavioral treatment. The device uses multiple physiological and behavioral inputs to inform its AI. The personalized intervention guides users towards sleep.  

With the support of a recently awarded Innovate UK grant, SleepCogni is fully focusing on the clinical investigations of its wearable device. In collaboration with Sheffield Hallam University, a large trial will be conducted enrolling 80 insomnia patients. This will provide key data on how SleepCogni’s technology treats insomnia, will optimize personalization algorithms, and provides large-scale user experience to pave the way for rapid commercialization. The first results from these studies are expected early next year.

One in three people struggle with sleep. For many there is a difficulty to switch off; with rumination, stress and anxiety contributing to insomnia. Pharmaceutical interventions have strong side effects and do not tackle these underlying psychological and behavioral challenges. It is therefore not surprising that cognitive and behavioral interventions are currently the most successful treatments for insomnia. However, access to such treatments is limited and importantly these treatments are provided outside the sleeping environment.

Richard Mills, CEO of SleepCogni commented:

We are delighted that suppliers, shareholders and outside specialists have such belief and enthusiasm for our ground breaking technology. We are focusing in the coming months on achieving three key deliverables: FDA clearance, clinical trials and commercial desire. We expect our business to be ready for a larger investment round mid 2020.”

Dr Maan van de Werken, CSO of SleepCogni added:

SleepCogni provides a unique intervention and a credible solution to a growing group of people that struggle to initiate sleep and that currently have limited viable treatment options. Our trial is a combination of gathering information on our intervention, our physiological and behavioral assessment of sleep in particular during the wake-sleep transition, and the user experience of our device. We are open to new scientific collaborations in this field.”