Phototherapy for insomnia disorder: Systematic review and meta-analysis

Insomnia disorder negatively affects the quality of life of patients. Phototherapy has proven effective in treating sleep problems. This study aimed to summarize the impact of phototherapy on sleep quality in patients with insomnia disorder and the factors influencing its effectiveness. We followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines and registered experiments on the PROSPERO website, retrieving 12 randomized controlled trials that included at least one sleep quality outcome measure available for analysis from the four databases. Meta-analysis was conducted using the RevMan software, using Mean Differences (MD) and its 95% Confidence Interval (CI) to evaluate treatment efficacy and the Cochrane bias risk assessment tool to assess bias risk. The results showed that phototherapy prolonged the total sleep time of patients, with the subgroup analysis indicating that this was related to the choice of phototherapy time and light intensity. Using high-intensity ([Formula: see text] [Formula: see text]) light in the morning may be more effective in improving sleep-related indicators. In summary, phototherapy improved the sleep quality of patients with insomnia disorder. However, owing to the limited sample size and heterogeneity of the included studies, more comprehensive experiments are needed to explore phototherapy conditions.