Daniel Taylor, Ph.D. and Kimberly Kelly, Ph.D. of the Clinical Health Psychology program at the University of North Texas have been awarded $442,838 to study the effects of insomnia on response to the influenza vaccine by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health.

Influenza and insomnia are significant public health problems. The 2009 H1N1 pandemic had greater clinical impact on children and young adults, prompting the CDC to issue an H1N1 Infections Alert for Institutions of Higher Education. Although the influenza vaccine is recommended for everyone, the vaccination is ineffective in a modest percent of cases. One possibility is that concomitant health problems (e.g., insomnia) serve as stressors which can reduce the effectiveness of the influenza vaccination via suppressed antibody responses to the viral strains. Insomnia plays an integral role in host defense and development of inflammatory diseases, and is regulated by and may be altered by a number of immune messengers (e.g., cytokines). These insomnia-immune relationships need translation to the more clinically relevant area of vaccination response. Considering the prevalence of insomnia (46%-69% of primary care patients; 10-15% of college students), it is important to determine if insomnia is a risk factor for reduced response to the influenza vaccination, while controlling for confounding medical conditions and medications. Major theories suggest that once insomnia becomes chronic, it becomes a major stressor, and is no longer a result of stress. If this is true, then it would follow that insomnia would result in reduced effectiveness of the influenza vaccination via suppressed antibody responses to the viral strains. The proposed R15 (AREA) pilot study moves beyond the paradigm of measuring isolated immune factors to a more integrated, systemic view of immune function, and is the first exploration of in vivo immune response in a healthy young adult insomnia population.

The primary aim of the proposed study is to determine if insomnia is a risk factor for lower influenza vaccine antibody response.

The study will begin recruiting college students at the University of North Texas with and without insomnia to participate in the study at the beginning of the Fall 2011 semester.