Southwest Regional Association of Sleep Professionals (SRASP)

Does Weather Affect Your Sleep? Six Tips To Sleep Through Storms »

Dream Studies DreamStudies is curated by Ryan Hurd, author of Sleep Paralysis, creator of Lucid Talisman, ebooks at DreamStudies.com

Research Shows Extra Sleep Boosts HGH And Enhances Athletic Performance Athletes looking to maximize their strength, stamina, and recovery time have a safe, legal way to enhance performance and gain an edge: Getting more sleep.

This Is Your Brain On Sleep Apnea Sleep apnea has been linked with a whole host of health problems, including obesity, diabetes, depression and memory problems. And now, a new animal study shows how big of an effect sleep apnea has on the brain's arteries, which could put a person at risk for stroke.

Upper airway resistance syndrome (UARS) is believed to be a disorder of increased airway resistance without the findings suggestive of sleep apnea. Generally, in sleep apnea there is a significant reduction in airflow and associated drops in the oxygen levels of the blood. There may be a complete cessation in breathing -- which is called apnea -- or a partial reduction called a hypopnea. In upper airway resistance there are neither hypopneic or apneic events, and there are no drops in the oxygen levels of the blood.

Nevertheless, there is often snoring and frequent brief arousals noted in sleep with significant excessive daytime sleepiness. It is thought that the frequent arousals associated with the condition lead to the sleepiness. These arousals may be due to a modestly increased effort to breathe, which can be detected with measurement of pressure changes within the esophagus.

Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Upper Airway Resistance Syndrome Steven Y. Park, MD, explains the difference between obstructive sleep apnea and upper airway resistance syndrome.

Illustrated Overview of Obstructive Sleep Apnea | Krames Patient Education This illustrated overview of Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) presents information in a straightforward style that increases comprehension. Includes tips on lif...

sleep apnea solutions

Sleep Apnea and CPAP How Sleep Apnea occurs and CPAP cures it.

Facts about snoring

20 percent of the adult population snores, rising to 60 percent of men above the age of 40.

Bed partners of snorers have their sleep interrupted an average of 21 times a night compared to an average of 27 times per night for the snorer.

The sound of snoring can cause the snorer to arouse from his sleep and prevent the snorer from going into deeper, more restful levels of sleep.

The more times per week someone snores, the more likely they are to have daytime sleepiness.

Some snorers produce sound that is louder than the decibel level allowed in the workplace, according to the Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) working environment standards.

The decibel level from snoring can be high enough to cause damage to the human ear.

Bed partners of particularly noisy snorers have been shown to have a substantial incidence of partial deafness in the ear that faces their snoring bedmate.

The internal vibration in the inner ear caused by snoring makes the snorer highly susceptible to hearing loss.

Heavy snorers develop small lesions around the nerve endings in the pharynx resulting from the chronic vibration of the tissues during snoring. These lesions may play a role in the development of more serious sleep disorders.

Snoring tends to get worse as snorers get older or gain weight. The passage of time causes the tissues in the throat to sag and vibrate more while weight gain causes fat deposits to narrow the air passageway in the throat. As the air passage in the throat narrows, whether through the passage of time or weight gain, more serious sleep-related breathing disorders occur.

Sleep is sweet to the labouring man - John Bunyan

Sleep Apnea PSA A public service announcement from the American Sleep Apnea Association

The Brain 15 REM Sleep and Dreaming

Sleepwalking - PubMed Health Sleepwalking is a disorder that occurs when people walk or do another activity while they are still asleep.

Providence Children's Hospital Providence Children's Hospital

Help Children Develop Healthy Habits 10 ways to help children develop healthy habits

2012 Scientific Innovations Award - Brain Research Foundation -

Ask Stanford Med: Rafael Pelayo answers questions on sleep research and offers tips for ‘springing f Changes to our sleep schedules like the upcoming change to daylight saving time can make it hard to fall or stay asleep. In an effort to help you spring forward and stay on track, Stanford’s Rafael Pelayo, MD, recently took questions on sleep research and offered techniques for making sure disruptio...

How to Reduce Stress: 10 Relaxation Techniques To Reduce Stress On-the-Spot If your hectic lifestyle has got you down, experts say relaxation techniques can bring you back into balance -- some in five minutes or less. Here's what to try.

Parasomnias: Nightmares, Night Terrors, Confusional Arousals and More Information on the disruptive sleep disorders called parasomnias, which include bedwetting, sleepwalking, nightmares, and more.

Digital Sleep Distractions ABCNEWS.COM - Digital devices may affect your teen's sleep and health.

Video: Sleep Deprivation Observed in 21 Volunteers Researchers lock up volunteers in sleep lab for six weeks to monitor results.

Good Night....

Real Doctors Helping Real People - Family & Health - Entertainment - Doctor Radio - SiriusXM Satelli Real doctors helping real people. Powered by NYU Langone Medical Center.

Sleeping Positions Research Summary (24 Studies) Sleeping posiotions can be chosen based on medical research of best sleep positions for better health

We're a Sleep-Deprived Nation Public siestas by high-profile figures suggest sleep-deprivation.

40 FACTS ABOUT SLEEP YOU PROBABLY DIDN'T KNOW...
(OR WERE TOO TIRED TO THINK ABOUT)


-The record for the longest period without sleep is 18 days, 21 hours, 40 minutes during a rocking chair marathon. The record holder reported hallucinations, paranoia, blurred vision, slurred speech and memory and concentration lapses.

- It's impossible to tell if someone is really awake without close medical supervision. People can take cat naps with their eyes open without even being aware of it.

- Anything less than five minutes to fall asleep at night means you're sleep deprived. The ideal is between 10 and 15 minutes, meaning you're still tired enough to sleep deeply, but not so exhausted you feel sleepy by day.

- A new baby typically results in 400-750 hours lost sleep for parents in the first year

- One of the best predictors of insomnia later in life is the development of bad habits from having sleep disturbed by young children.

- The continuous brain recordings that led to the discovery of REM (rapid eye-movement) sleep were not done until 1953, partly because the scientists involved were concerned about wasting paper.

- REM sleep occurs in bursts totalling about 2 hours a night, usually beginning about 90 minutes after falling asleep.

- Dreams, once thought to occur only during REM sleep, also occur (but to a lesser extent) in non-REM sleep phases. It's possible there may not be a single moment of our sleep when we are actually dreamless.

- REM dreams are characterised by bizarre plots, but non-REM dreams are repetitive and thought-like, with little imagery - obsessively returning to a suspicion you left your mobile phone somewhere, for example.

- Certain types of eye movements during REM sleep correspond to specific movements in dreams, suggesting at least part of the dreaming process is analagous to watching a film

- No-one knows for sure if other species dream but some do have sleep cycles similar to humans.

- Elephants sleep standing up during non-REM sleep, but lie down for REM sleep.

- Some scientists believe we dream to fix experiences in long-term memory, that is, we dream about things worth remembering. Others reckon we dream about things worth forgetting - to eliminate overlapping memories that would otherwise clog up our brains.

- Dreams may not serve any purpose at all but be merely a meaningless byproduct of two evolutionary adaptations - sleep and consciousness.

- REM sleep may help developing brains mature. Premature babies have 75 per cent REM sleep, 10 per cent more than full-term bubs. Similarly, a newborn kitten puppy rat or hampster experiences only REM sleep, while a newborn guinea pig (which is much more developed at birth) has almost no REM sleep at all.

- Scientists have not been able to explain a 1998 study showing a bright light shone on the backs of human knees can reset the brain's sleep-wake clock.

- British Ministry of Defence researchers have been able to reset soldiers' body clocks so they can go without sleep for up to 36 hrs. Tiny optical fibres embedded in special spectacles project a ring of bright white light (with a spectrum identical to a sunrise) around the edge of soldiers' retinas, fooling them into thinking they have just woken up. The system was first used on US pilots during the bombing of Kosovo.

- Seventeen hours of sustained wakefulness leads to a decrease in performance equivalent to a blood alcohol-level of 0.05%.

- The 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska, the Challenger space shuttle disaster and the Chernobyl nuclear accident have all been attributed to human errors in which sleep-deprivation played a role.

- The NRMA estimates fatigue is involved in one in 6 fatal road accidents.

- Exposure to noise at night can suppress immune function even if the sleeper doesn’t wake. Unfamiliar noise, and noise during the first and last two hours of sleep, has the greatest disruptive effect on the sleep cycle.

- The "natural alarm clock" which enables some people to wake up more or less when they want to is caused by a burst of the stress hormone adrenocorticotropin. Researchers say this reflects an unconscious anticipation of the stress of waking up.

- Some sleeping tablets, such as barbiturates suppress REM sleep, which can be harmful over a long period.

- In insomnia following bereavement, sleeping pills can disrupt grieving.

- Tiny luminous rays from a digital alarm clock can be enough to disrupt the sleep cycle even if you do not fully wake. The light turns off a "neural switch" in the brain, causing levels of a key sleep chemical to decline within minutes.

- To drop off we must cool off; body temperature and the brain's sleep-wake cycle are closely linked. That's why hot summer nights can cause a restless sleep. The blood flow mechanism that transfers core body heat to the skin works best between 18 and 30 degrees. But later in life, the comfort zone shrinks to between 23 and 25 degrees - one reason why older people have more sleep disorders.

- A night on the grog will help you get to sleep but it will be a light slumber and you won't dream much.

- After five nights of partial sleep deprivation, three drinks will have the same effect on your body as six would when you've slept enough.

- Humans sleep on average around three hours less than other primates like chimps, rhesus monkeys, squirrel monkeys and baboons, all of whom sleep for 10 hours.

- Ducks at risk of attack by predators are able to balance the need for sleep and survival, keeping one half of the brain awake while the other slips into sleep mode.

- Ten per cent of snorers have sleep apnoea, a disorder which causes sufferers to stop breathing up to 300 times a night and significantly increases the risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke.

- Snoring occurs only in non-REM sleep

- Teenagers need as much sleep as small children (about 10 hrs) while those over 65 need the least of all (about six hours). For the average adult aged 25-55, eight hours is considered optimal

- Some studies suggest women need up to an hour's extra sleep a night compared to men, and not getting it may be one reason women are much more susceptible to depression than men.

- Feeling tired can feel normal after a short time. Those deliberately deprived of sleep for research initially noticed greatly the effects on their alertness, mood and physical performance, but the awareness dropped off after the first few days.

- Diaries from the pre-electric-light-globe Victorian era show adults slept nine to 10 hours a night with periods of rest changing with the seasons in line with sunrise and sunsets.

- Most of what we know about sleep we've learned in the past 25 years.

- As a group, 18 to 24 year-olds deprived of sleep suffer more from impaired performance than older adults.

- Experts say one of the most alluring sleep distractions is the 24-hour accessibility of the internet.

- The extra-hour of sleep received when clocks are put back at the start of daylight in Canada has been found to coincide with a fall in the number of road accidents. http://www.abc.net.au/science/sleep/facts.htm

Sleep Apnea Awareness Day 2012 The American Sleep Apnea Association announced today that April 18 has been designated Sleep Apnea Awareness Day.

Top 5 Sleep Apnea Myths and Truths 1. Sleep apnea is genetic False. The exact cause of sleep apnea has not yet been determined. No distinct pattern of hereditability has been identified. While it is common for members of a family to suffer from the same type of sleep apnea, it is possible that this is linked to lifestyle rather t...

Sleep apnea linked to silent strokes Lisa Shives, M.D., is the founder of Northshore Sleep Medicine in Evanston, Illinois. She blogs regularly on The Chart. Read more from her at Dr. Lisa Shives’ Sleep Better Blog.