Suvorexant in insomnia: efficacy, safety and place in therapy.

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Rhyne DN, Anderson SL

Suvorexant in insomnia: efficacy, safety and place in therapy.

Ther Adv Drug Saf. 2015 Oct;6(5):189-95. doi: 10.1177/2042098615595359.

PubMed ID

26478806 [ View in PubMed

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Abstract

Insomnia is a highly prevalent disorder that can occur in conjunction with other medical or psychiatric conditions or can occur in the absence of a coexisting disorder. Regardless, treatment of insomnia is beneficial to the patient and may benefit comorbidities if they exist. Nonpharmacologic modalities such as sleep hygiene and stimulus controls are important mainstays of insomnia therapy, but may not be sufficient to treat the disorder. Dual orexin receptor antagonists (DORAs) are a new class of insomnia medication that target wakefulness-promoting neuropeptides to regulate the sleep-wake cycle. Suvorexant is the first DORA to be approved and has demonstrated efficacy at decreasing both time to sleep onset and increasing total sleep time compared with placebo. Suvorexant has a novel mechanism of action and may represent an alternative for patients who cannot tolerate or do not receive benefit from traditional sleep agents. Suvorexant is generally effective and well tolerated, but has not been compared head to head with traditional sleep agents and being only newly available, lacks a longer-term 'real-world' experience base.

DrugBank Data that Cites this Article

Drug Enzymes

Drug	Enzyme	Kind	Organism	Pharmacological Action	Actions
Suvorexant	Cytochrome P450 3A4	Protein	Humans	No	Substrate	Details