Key takeaways:
- Participants who responded to biologic therapy had better sleep efficiency and less time awake in bed vs. nonresponders.
- Sleep biomarkers could be potential indicators of therapeutic response.
CHICAGO — Wearable device-derived sleep metrics may help monitor inflammatory bowel disease activity and response to biologic therapy, according to research presented at Digestive Disease Week.
Results of a study using the Oura Ring (Oura) showed those who responded to biologic therapy had less time awake in bed and better sleep efficiency according to the wearable device and other collected data.
Robert Hirten
“These findings are promising, but still early,” Robert Hirten, MD, associate professor of medicine and AI and human health at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, told Healio. “In this study, we are seeing a meaningful signal, where wearable-derived sleep metrics appear to change in ways that align with treatment response, and these findings are consistent with what we have observed in our prior work using wearable data to monitor IBD flares.”
Hirten and colleagues evaluated whether wearable-derived sleep metrics could help assess response to biologic therapy in a study of 60 adults (mean age, 34.5 years; 53.5% women; ) with IBD and active inflammation. Twenty-seven had ulcerative colitis and 33 had Crohn’s disease.
All participants wore an Oura Ring daily to collect nightly sleep data and were followed for 14 weeks after beginning treatment with biologics.
Researchers tracked inflammation by monitoring C-reactive protein at baseline and weeks 2, 6 and 14. The defined responders as those with CRP levels of 5 mg/L or less after treatment initiation, with remission maintained through week 14.
Additionally, researchers assessed fatigue and sleep using Patient Global Impression of Change and Patient Global Impression of Severity.
“Sleep was a particularly compelling metric to study because prior work from our group and others has shown that sleep is often disrupted in the setting of active inflammation in IBD,” Hirten said.
“We had previously shown that sleep measures captured by wearables could differentiate periods of active inflammation from periods without inflammation in IBD, so our hypothesis was that similar patterns would be seen in patients starting biologic therapy.”
Data showed time awake in bed decreased significantly at week 6 (–2.9%, P < .01) and week 14 (–3.8%, P < .01), while sleep efficiency improved at week 14 (+3.6%, P < .05) compared with baseline.
Participants also reported consistent improvements in fatigue and sleep at weeks 2, 4, 6, 8 and 14, with the most improvement noted at week 14.
Twelve responders to biologic therapy exhibited greater reductions in time awake in bed at both week 6 (–4.7%) and week 14 (–4.4%) and improvements in sleep efficiency at week 6 (+5.5%) and week 14 (+6.4%) compared with 17 nonresponders.
Researchers observed individuals had higher sleep efficiency, less time awake in bed, reduced light sleep and greater deep sleep in remission compared with periods of active inflammation.
“The main take-home message is that wearable-derived metrics, including sleep, may provide a new way to monitor IBD activity and treatment response outside of traditional clinic visits,” Hirten said. “However, this is still early-stage work, but hopefully points toward a future in which continuous, objective data from wearable devices could complement our existing monitoring strategies and help us identify earlier whether patients are improving or may need closer follow-up.
“The next step for our group is to continue this ongoing study and build on the initial signals we are seeing,” he added. “Specifically, we want to evaluate these findings in the larger cohort we are actively recruiting.”
For more information:
Robert Hirten, MD, can be reached at robert.hirten@mountsinai.org.
Sources/Disclosures
Source:
Hirten R, et al. Wearable derived sleep metrics differentiate responders from non-responders following biologic therapy in inflammatory bowel disease. Presented at: Digestive Disease Week; May 2-5, 2026; Chicago.
Disclosures:
Hirten reports advisory board roles with AbbVie and Bristol Myers Squibb; a speaker role with Sanofi; and research support from EnLiSense, Intralytix and Janssen. Please see the study for all other authors’ relevant financial disclosures.
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