Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “Insomnia”
Insomnia is a significant problem in the United States, and for individuals grappling with mood and/or anxiety disorders, sleep loss can contribute to ill health, including immune function, cognitive functioning, and even cardiovascular problems. However, use of medication for insomnia does not have a good track record. These medications have significant risks and adverse side effects, and often lose effectiveness …
How can something as simple as manipulating the time you sleep – chronotherapy – work so well to improve the quality of your sleep, your energy during the day and your mood? A young mother who has often complained of feeling tired with many problems with aches and pains came in with a big smile today… “I am feeling so …
One of the curious quirks of how our brain works has to do with how it responds to situations associated with fatigue, depression and sleep. Usually the brain regulates sleep well. Every night, after we have been awake for the appropriate amount of time, our brain responds to signals from the “clock” cells in the pineal gland and to the …
My fall preparation for 2017 illustrates the lessons learned over the past two years about what affects sleep.
Using Shuti to Get Better Sleep Better sleep is a priority for many of the people I see. Recently I’ve started supporting clients in using an online CBTi (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia) program. I decided to check out the program for myself to get a better feel for what clients are working with. Ultimately I recommend SHUTi to clients …
In an era of ever-present video and constant texting and snapchatting, many parents are trying to figure out how to deal with childhood insomnia. Here is a quick guide for busy parents of things to think about and things to do if your child is having trouble getting to sleep or getting enough sleep. Consider possible causes – Stress. Kids, …
What is “jet lag” and why do most people feel worse when they travel around the globe in one direction, rather than the other? An article in the journal Chaos, summarized in the New York Times, suggests an answer. And offers some hope that you can reduce the severity and duration of the symptoms. For people with mood disorders, this …
Apps to monitor and improve sleep were recently reviewed in the New York Times. Using an app to try to improve your sleep is a strategy that many people try. Some have found that it can be helpful in the long run, and it helps to use a well designed program. The New York Times reviewed SleepBot (available free on Android …
“If only I could get a good night’s sleep my mood would be much better.” Many people who suffer from chronic depression are aware of the relationship between the quality of their sleep and their levels of mood and anxiety. A study published in the April 2016 addition of the British journal, Lancet Psychiatry, supports this view. 1100 internet users (aged …
For many people with depression the idea of taking a nap makes a lot of sense. On the other hand, staying in bed at the wrong times of day can be associated with worsened depression and increased fatigue. An article in June in the New York Times entitled, “How to Nap” seemed like an interesting introduction to the topic. In …
The FDA just approved a cool new sleep treatment. And we don’t mean that it is trendy, the treatment involves cooling your forehead in order to speed the onset of sleep. The fact that cooling temperatures are associated with increased sleepiness shouldn’t be new to anyone who has been on a long distance flight. Pilots routinely turned down the cabin …
What is the best treatment for chronic insomnia? The American College of Physicians has just published the results of a careful review of all of the research in this area. The preferred treatment for insomnia is cognitive behavioral therapy (CBTi) which we offer through this website – read about it at the bottom of this page. In their review, ACP …
Andy and the Nighttime Child – Staying Up Late In our practice we work with a lot of bright young people in the information technology industry. It often seems as if all of them stay up until all hours of the night certainly many of them do and sometimes to their detriment. We know that sleeping late is one of …
In an article that appeared in the journal SLEEP in February, 2016, and which was summarized in a New York Times post entitled “Poor Sleep Gives You the Munchies,” researchers report that one way that poor sleep and insomnia may lead to weight gain is that insomnia increases activity of the endocannabinoid system in the brain, the part of the …
In February the National Sleep Foundation announced the publication of new guidelines for the amount of sleep that we should be getting based on a rigorous review of the literature. The guidelines suggested that adults should be getting between seven and nine hours of sleep. The results were widely distributed and commented on. It was noted that many people in our …
What is the point of sleep? We have a page on this blog devoted to the question but in the last couple of years there’s been an outpouring of research pointing to the critical importance of sleep in sorting out memories (getting rid of unuseful ones) and generally “tuning up” the brain. A fascinating article last year pointed to evidence …
A recent study confirms that cognitive behavioral therapy is effective for chronic insomnia and is often more effective than medications. “What surprises us is that there isn’t more awareness of this treatment’s effectiveness and that there haven’t been more attempts to make the treatment more available to patients,” James M. Trauer of the Melbourne Sleep Disorders Centre in Australia told …
Insomnia treatment may have long-term beneficial effects on the health of your brain. Study in the Journal Biological Psychiatry published in February, 2015 looked at 123 older adults with chronic insomnia who were randomized to one of two active treatments (twice-weekly cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBTi) for 4 months or a relaxation therapy) or a control group who received educational …
CBT for insomnia (CBTi) is clearly preferable to taking sleeping medications for most people. Studies show that cognitive behavioral therapy is associated with greater improvements in sleep quality than sleeping medications, and that those improvements are more durable, and, particularly in the elderly, sleeping medications are associated with significant adverse effects, including an increase in mortality. But it can be a hard …
There are two herbs or supplements that have the best data supporting their effectiveness. Both appear to be safe but have modest effectiveness. Melatonin Valerian (Alone or Combined with Hops or Melissa) Melatonin: Rapid Effect on Sleep The body uses melatonin as part of the way it regulates the sleep-wake cycle. Levels of melatonin increase as light decreases (at …
