AAST Shares Takeaways From Workforce Summit

Heather Rich
hrich@aastweb.org

Chicago – AAST is pleased to share industry takeaways from its recent AAST Summit in which sleep professionals from various sleep-industry entities gathered to discuss results from AAST’s 2021 Workforce Survey. The group also identified actionable next steps for sharing insights and conclusions with the larger sleep community.

AAST hosted a one-day summit on Saturday, April 2, 2022, in Chicago with members of the sleep community, including sleep technologists, sleep lab managers, physicians and industry vendors from AAST, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM), Advanced Sleep Management, the Board of Registered Polysomnographic Technologists (BRPT), Ensodata, Greensfelder, Hemker, & Gale PC, Northwestern Medicine, the North Dakota Center for Sleep and the Society of Behavioral Sleep Medicine. All major stakeholders of AAST were invited by AAST’s board of directors to participate in discussions on topics such as sleep education, the incorporation of technology advancements, such as AI, into the industry, current workforce demographics and what the future of sleep medicine and care will look like.

Collective takeaways and goals from the summit and the presentations include:

• Redefining sleep technology and advocating for the importance of the profession by creating a path for sleep technologists that allows for growth and retention
• Embracing change in health care and viewing technology as an opportunity
• Developing education that drives critical thinking in terms of career development
• Understanding revenue billing opportunities and how they will broaden the sleep technologist field 

AAST, along with summit attendees, are now working to develop a peer-reviewed paper, expected to publish later this year. Updates on the paper’s progress will be shared on AAST’s website at https://www.aastweb.org/. 

About AAST

Established in 1978, AAST is a community of more than 2,900 sleep professionals whose skills, expertise, knowledge and experience help support and improve the quality of sleep and wakefulness in all people. For sleep technologists, managers and educators who seek timely and applicable sleep-related knowledge, AAST provides education, resources and collaboration with like-minded individuals to keep them abreast of the evolving sleep field. AAST members include sleep technologists, sleep center managers, educators and other health care professionals involved with sleep. 

For more information, please visit www.aastweb.org. 

About the AAST 2021 Workforce Survey

AAST has been working to understand current and anticipated market conditions in the field of sleep technology and better prepare those in the profession to address or adjust to those trends. In March of 2021, AAST conducted a workforce survey, inviting sleep professionals to share insights on their current job role, practices and what they believed to be the future state of the field of sleep. From there, AAST leadership — in conjunction with AAST staff — interpreted and analyzed the data and results, creating a finalized report that was released in August of 2021. 

To view the finalized report, visit https://www.aastweb.org/newsandevents/executive-summary-state-of-sleep-technology-and-workforce.