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Persistent insomnia

Sleep that has not responded to the advice.

You have already worked through the list, and most of the versions of it. We still start at the beginning, and we take the whole history, including what you have tried and what happened each time.

Start with a nurse call
  • Registered practitioners
  • Prior treatments reviewed
  • We don't own or run a pharmacy
  • Every state and territory
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The advice you have had

This was never a discipline problem.

If you have not slept properly for years, you already know the list. Screens, caffeine, a cooler room, the same hour every night, getting up again after twenty minutes. You have worked through it, more than once, and you can probably recite it faster than the person suggesting it. That list is general sleep advice, and it is not the same thing as treatment.

Some people have also worked through a structured programme, usually called CBT for insomnia. That is a different thing from general sleep advice, and Australian sleep guidelines put it first for long standing sleep problems. If you have not been through it, your nurse will ask about that, because it may be the right next step for you.

Most people stop mentioning it eventually, because saying it out loud tends to produce advice, and the advice is usually something they finished trying years ago.

So it is worth saying plainly. The length of that list is not evidence against you. Sleep is one of the things a body is meant to do without instruction, which is why failing at it feels like a personal defect rather than a medical problem. It is not one, and you do not have to argue the point here.

So the nurse call goes back to the start. What was going on around you when this began, and what happened at each stage as you worked through the list. Sleep that stands on its own and sleep that sits alongside another condition are different problems, and the difference usually shows up in the early detail.

Before you book

Everything a nurse will ask about your sleep.

Here is the whole conversation, so you know what you are walking into before you book. It is the same set of questions for everybody who calls, and there are no right answers to any of them.

Long answers are expected. If you have a list going back years, bring it, because it is the single most useful thing you can arrive with and it gets read properly.

Your history

  • 01 Whether you snore, whether anyone has seen you stop breathing or gasp in your sleep, and how sleepy you are during the day. These point to a different sleep problem that needs treating in its own right, so we ask about it first.
  • 02 How long it has been going on, what it looked like at the start, and whether it has changed shape since.
  • 03 What you have already tried. Prescribed, over the counter, behavioural, and the structured programmes. In what order, and for how long.
  • 04 What worked for a while before it stopped, and roughly how long that lasted. This is often the most useful thing you can tell us.
  • 05 What left you flat, and what you had to stop because of how it left you the next day.
  • 06 Other conditions, other medicines, and how the two interact with each other.
  • 07 What your days and nights actually look like. Work, shift patterns, physical health, and the things you have had to arrange around it.
  • 08 Anyone else involved in providing care to you, which could be your GP, a specialist, or anyone else treating you. We won't contact anyone without talking with you about it first, but we may need some information from other providers to give you the safest care. We'll always discuss this with you directly.

We ask you to fill out forms ahead of time so we have a picture to work from. Nothing you put into a form decides anything, and there are no right or wrong answers. We ask you about your life, and then we listen to what you tell us.

Start with a nurse call

What happens on the call

Two clinicians working with you.

  1. 01Nurse

    You pick the time yourself

    Choose a slot from the calendar when you book, so you are not waiting on anybody to call you back. Fill in the intake form, and an Ahpra registered nurse then takes your history properly on the call, for as long as that takes.

  2. 02Doctor

    A time the two of you agree

    You and the nurse settle on a time for the doctor while you are still on that first call. Your doctor reads what the nurse wrote before the two of you meet, so you are not opening by listing everything you have tried all over again.

  3. 03Decision

    You will know by the end of it

    The decision is made during your consultation, so you are not left waiting on a letter. Whatever the doctor concludes, the reasoning gets written down and the record is yours. If you would like your GP to have a copy, we will send one.

Start with a nurse call
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Being straight with you

You have been promised things before.

You have been told before that something would work, probably by more than one person. So we will start somewhere more useful than another promise. If your nurse or doctor decides this isn't the right service for you, we'll refund your consultation fee in full, which is the only promise on this page worth making.

Not every service is right for everyone. Where someone is better served elsewhere, we say so plainly, tell them why, and help them find somewhere to go next. We can't tell you in advance how your consultation will end, because that decision belongs to the practitioner who assesses you, and it isn't one a website should be making on their behalf. Ahpra's guidance for Australian practitioners is clear that this should never be a first option, and that there should always be a way back out.

We see patients in every Australian state and territory, and you are welcome to ask for the name and registration details of whoever is treating you, at any point.

What this costs, all of it.

  1. Consultation

    $69

    Taken when you book

    If your nurse or doctor decides this isn't the right service for you, we'll refund your consultation fee in full.

  2. Nurse and doctor

    Included

    Both consultations

    There is no second fee between your nurse call and your doctor consultation. If you need to see a doctor again later, that consultation is charged at the same fee.

  3. Anything prescribed

    Variable

    Set by the pharmacy

    This sits outside the consultation fee. If anything is prescribed, you choose which Australian pharmacy fills it, your own local one included. That pharmacy quotes you directly, and you pay them. Neither the PBS nor Medicare pays towards it.

Start with a nurse call

Begin your care when you're ready.

A short intake online, then your nurse call and doctor consult. $69 taken when you book, and refunded in full if this isn't the right service for you.

Start with a nurse call

About 5 minutes online to start. Your $69 consultation fee is taken when you book, and refunded in full if this isn't the right service for you.

You have already done the part everybody keeps suggesting.

Start with a nurse call