Objective To enhance sleep quality of intensive care patients. Methods Best evidence were identified through the evidencebased nursing approach to develop sleep management protocol, then 20 experts in critical care medicine and nursing were invited to participate in a tworound of consultation using the Delphi method. Results Twelve highquality evidence were included, and the sleep management protocol was composed of five dimensions of insomnia diagnosis, sleep quality assessment, risk factors assessment, risk factors intervention and other measures to improve sleep quality, totaling to 11 items. The response rate of experts was 100%, the coefficient of authority of the experts was 0.84, the coefficients of variation ranged from 0.17 to 0.21, and the Kendall′s coefficient of concordance was 0.196 and 0.249 in the two rounds respectively (P<0.01 for both). Conclusion The sleep management protocol is meticulously developed with high reliability for ICU patients, so it can be used to assess sleep quality of ICU patients after validation.