A Pilot of a Personalized Circadian mHealth to Improve Sleep in Night Shift Workers (SAIL)

February 26, 2026 updated by: Philip Cheng, Henry Ford Health System
The goal of this project is to establish the evidence base for equitable accessibility and implementation of the precision sleep medicine mobile application, SHIFT.

Study Overview

Status

Recruiting

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Estimated)

300

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact

Study Contact Backup

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Michigan
      • Novi, Michigan, United States, 48377
        • Recruiting
        • Henry Ford Columbus Medical Center
        • Contact:
        • Contact:

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

  • Adult
  • Older Adult

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Inadequate sleep duration (habitual sleep less than 7 hours during the day)
  • Willingness to download the SHIFT app and follow the lighting recommendations
  • Ability to follow a set sleep schedule of 7 hours in bed after the night shifts
  • Working at least 4 night shifts a month
  • Shifts that must begin between 18:00 and 02:00 and last 8 to 12 hours
  • Score of 8 or above on the Epworth Sleepiness scale and/or a score of 8 or above on the Insomnia Severity Index

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Other independent sleep disorders (e.g., obstructive sleep apnea, narcolepsy, etc.)
  • History of seizures or other significant neurological disorders
  • Bipolar disorder
  • Termination of shift schedule
  • Pregnancy
  • Current use of medications that impact sleep-wake functioning
  • Alcohol and substance use disorder

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Double

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: SHIFT App
Participants in this condition will receive an access code to download the mobile application and conduct an orientation to SHIFT and the study procedures with a study team member. They will then enter four weeks of study directed use of SHIFT where they are trained on a daily procedure of opening SHIFT at the beginning of their day and planning their day in accordance with the app recommendations. App usage (4 times per week) will be incentivized with weekly bonuses added to study compensation. Following the four weeks of study-directed use, participants will continue with self-directed use. At four months, participants will then complete a booster session with two additional weeks of study-directed use, followed by self-directed use until the end of the study. The structure with the booster session has evidence for maintaining treatment gains and is also in alignment with the commercialization plan.
Other: Personalized circadian mHealth
SHIFT is a mobile application designed to improve sleep in night shift workers. The SHIFT mobile application is used to collect data from an Apple Watch to assess an individual shift worker's body-clock timing and make personalized recommendations of light exposure schedules that are designed to align the body-clock with the night shift work schedule.
Other Names:
  • SHIFT
No Intervention: Waitlist Control
Participants in this condition will only complete questionnaires for the initial eight months. Those who remain shift workers will have the option of receiving the SHIFT app and the option to complete follow-up surveys in the same manner as the SHIFT App condition.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Establish the effect of SHIFT on stakeholder-centered outcomes.
Time Frame: From enrollment to the 8 month point.

Aim 1a. Measure the effect of SHIFT on work productivity and satisfaction compared to waitlist control using the Job Satisfaction Index. Effect will be tested using a mixed-effects linear regression model with participants as the random effect and Time, Condition, and the Time × Condition interaction term as the fixed effects.

Aim 1b: Measure the effect of SHIFT on global health compared to waitlist control using the NIH PROMIS Global Health questionnaire. Effect will be tested using the same method as Aim 1a.

Aim 1c. Measure the effect of SHIFT on turnover compared to waitlist control, measured at 8-month follow-up. Turnover will be operationalized as an individual who has either terminated the position they were in at baseline or is no longer engaged in shift work as operationalized in the study. Effect will be determined using a generalized mixed-effects regression with turnover as a dichotomous outcome.
From enrollment to the 8 month point.
Compare use experience and accuracy of SLEEP Android to the original iOS version.
Time Frame: From enrollment to the 8 month point.

Aim 2a. Measure user experience of Android and iOS versions of SHIFT using the User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ). The following ranges of clinical indifference will be used: ± 3 points on the User Experience Questionnaire based on the bin size of 6 for each of the thresholds (bad, neutral, and good user experience).

Aim 2b. Measure accuracy of predicted circadian misalignment (CM), sleep, and depression in Android and iOS versions. CM will be indexed with the outputs of the biomathematical model of the circadian system. Sleep will be measured using the Insomnia Severity Index and sleep diaries. Depression will be measured using the Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology. The following ranges of clinical indifference will be used: 1) predicted CM = ± 3 hours based on approximately 2x the absolute mean error of our model predictions, 2) insomnia severity = ± 6 points, and 3) depression = 28.5% of the QIDS-SR16 score.
From enrollment to the 8 month point.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Assess facilitators and barriers to engagement and implementation.
Time Frame: Immediately following completion of 8-month treatment period.
A series of semi-structured interviews will be used for thematic analysis, and a comprehensive roadmap for future app updates based on user feedback. The semi-structured interviews will utilize the interview-guide approach following the CFIR framework selected for this study. Six phases will be followed for thematic analysis: (1) data familiarization, (2) generating initial codes, (3) searching for themes, (4) reviewing themes, (5) defining and naming themes, and (6) producing the report. We will combine deductive and inductive techniques to increase the accuracy of thematic analyses.
Immediately following completion of 8-month treatment period.

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Henry Ford Health System

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

October 23, 2023

Primary Completion (Estimated)

June 1, 2027

Study Completion (Estimated)

June 1, 2027

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

January 23, 2025

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

January 30, 2025

First Posted (Actual)

February 5, 2025

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

March 2, 2026

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

February 26, 2026

Last Verified

February 1, 2026

More Information

Terms related to this study

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 16061

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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