Sleep Better, Perform Better at Sports

Photo Credit: Aaron Jacobs

In a recent article I read online at ScienceDaily.com, I learned about a new study showing that "athletes who get an extra amount of sleep are more likely to improve their performance in a game."

I have to say, the anecdotal evidence was already there, but I was curious to read if the researchers found an actual connection between extra sleep and an athlete's performance that didn't necessarily have to do with mood or so-called perceived rate of exertion. You see, there's been little research to link the relationship between extra sleep and athletic performance. But we all know from experience that it seems more difficult to exercise, for example, after a bad night's sleep than after a great one. But it could be all in the mind. The muscles that move in physical activity may not need a full night's sleep to operate just as well.

The Stanford men's basketball team was the guinea pig here. Scientists compared their performance after letting them sleep their normal patterns for two weeks and then allowing them to sleep as much as they wanted for another extended period. What they found is that the men had faster sprint times and increased free-throws when they got as much sleep as possible. They also reported better moods (no surprise there) and more energy (again, no surprise).

The study doesn't really bring to light anything we don't already know. When we're tired and cranky, we don't want to exert all that much energy in physical activity. The jury is still out on whether that's a factor of just "mental fatigue" as in mood and irritability, or whether there's an actual explanation for decreased performance in the body irrespective of how we think we feel.

I know one thing for sure - as an avid basketball fan, I hope my favorite teams heed this advice: get your Zs!

Related Topics:

• How to Sleep Like an Olympic Athlete
• Rev Up Your Energy

Technorati Tags: sleep, sports performance, health and wellness

Sleep-Deprived Daredevil Lands His Balloon Safely

Photo Credit: biskuit

When I heard through England's Telegraph online paper about business millionaire David Hempleman-Adams's latest adventure - ballooning across the Atlantic in a wicker basket the size of a big chair - my first though was "that's just plain dumb."

We hear about these thrill seekers' challenges a few times a year, and it's always interesting to me how these types of exploits are at the mercy of sleep. If there's one thing that could derail such extreme feats, it's the need for sleep when there's no one else to take over the job.

This man's voyage seemed especially daunting. His basket was a 20th of the size of those used by Richard Branson to cross the same ocean. So he couldn't climb above bad weather. The trip covered 2,000 miles - from the shores of Newfoundland, Canada, to France. According to the story, he has a great fear of the ocean...so maybe he was trying to get over the fear?

He dropped from 11,000 feet to 9,000 feet when he began to fall asleep. And here's the best part, as reported by the Telegraph: "At one point I saw lights coming out of the darkness towards me. I thought it was a plane with its landing lights on and got hold of my strobe light to warn it away, but the lights were still there. Very bright. Then I realized it was a planet. It's the lack of sleep."

Which made me wonder: was the feat about traversing the Atlantic or was it more about trying to stay awake? Often people hack sleep to complete solo missions like this: Why You Can't Hack Sleep.

He did make it across the pond. He landed three days after takeoff in the Burgundy countryside. I hope he got a nap in while awaiting his crew to arrive (they found him an hour later), even though he did land in a field of cows.

You can read David Hemleman-Adams's blog about the adventure: Up, Up and Away

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: What's Your Sleep Personality?
• WebMD Video: Napping on the Job

Technorati Tags: sleep deprivation ballooning, health and wellness

Sleep Deprivation Leads to Unhealthy Eating Habits

I was reading a recent article on NutritionHorizon.com, an online source for updates in health research, and came across a news piece about a study pointing to a link between sleep deprivation and poor eating habits.

I didn't see that as "groundbreaking." The last time I was tired, under-slept, and cranky, guess what - I didn't feel like cooking a nutritious, homegrown meal. Grabbing a quick meal was more like what I had in mind. So when I read about a new study that points to a link between sleep deprivation and poor eating habits, it seems like an obvious conclusion that anecdotal evidence has always shown: when you don't get enough sleep, you're more likely to avoid preparing your own meals at home and, God forbid, resort to fast food.

We've known for some time now that the amount of sleep we get affects our physical health, from our moods to our mental abilities and even our risk for things like depression, obesity, and cardiovascular disease. Pretty much all of these health issues also share a relationship with the food we eat; it's a big tangled web. Eat well, be well. Eat poorly, feel poorly. Sleep poorly, feel poorly. Sleep well, have lots of energy to act like a master chef in the kitchen!

Perhaps the takeaway here is to be more vigilant when we're tired and do our best to make healthy choices at our next meal. This doesn't mean we have to fight our exhaustion and force ourselves to cook (after all, that would put a damper on one's mood, which is part of that "health" equation). There are lots of quick and nutritious options nowadays between restaurants and grocery stores. Who knows; you just might get a good night's sleep after a wholesome meal.

Related Blog post: The Sleep Doctor's List of Sleep-Friendly Foods

Related video on sleep deprivation:



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• The Dream Diet: Losing Weight While You Sleep
• WebMD Video: Night Eating in Your Sleep

Technorati Tags: sleep, diet, health and wellness

Sleep-Deprived Teens, Smoking, And Drinking: Tell Me Something I Don't Know!

When I was in high school, staying up all night long was as normal as homework! I recently read a study showing a link between sleep deprivation and an increased risk for adolescents to pick up smoking and drinking. What exactly do these researchers think is going on late at night?

This doesn't sound all that surprising to me. Which came first, the smoking and the drinking or the lack of sleep? What's more, because the study was done based on questionnaires, I wonder if researchers were able to take into account micro-sleeps that students had unknowingly during classes.

Teens face a lot of pressures these days, juggling high expectations from peers and family members with the rigors of school and life in general. My two children aren't quite as old as the average age of the kids observed in the study (14.6 years), but it's troubling to think a kid who doesn't log eight hours of sleep a night is more likely to get addicted to smoking and drinking.

As parents, sometimes we have to let our kids be kids and rest assured that we've taught them all we can so they make good choices. Encouraging good sleep hygiene despite the trials of those adolescent years is one thing that will help them (hopefully) mature into healthy, happy adults - even if they do choose to stay out late and sleep in all morning!

Want to learn more about teens and sleep deprivation? Watch this video:



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• Common Sleep Disorders in Teens
• WebMD Video: Teen Brain

Technorati Tags: sleep, teens, smoking, drinking, health and wellness

Asleep at the X-Ray: Sleep and Airport Screeners

I think about what sleep deprivation can mean in all sorts of situations. Imagine what could happen under the knife when a sleepy surgeon is on call. Or a sleepy truck-driver pulling a load of explosive material on a crowded highway. Just last week a new study pointed to yet another potential hazard for the general public: sleepy baggage screeners at airports.

A lot has changed since 9/11 in how we travel, from what we're allowed to pack and carry on an airplane to how rigorous the screening is at security checkpoints. Now a Boston researcher at Brigham and Women's Hospital has showed that sleep-deprived screeners are more likely to complete searches more quickly (and with less diligence), as well as make more mistakes.

I know from my own travels that there can be enormous inconsistencies in the rigor of screening just based on who is on the job at the time. It's human nature to do a job either more or less efficiently based on one's levels of energy. But when certain jobs relate directly to the health and safety of the public, the stakes get higher.

My hope is that studies like this help fuel an awareness of the potential effects sleep deprivation can have in critical areas of public safety. Airport employees who need to stay vigilant would do well to "screen" their exhaustion throughout the day and take naps when necessary.

Related Topics:

• Sleep Deprivation at the Workplace
• Sleep Deprivation Blurs Moral Judgment

Technorati Tags: sleep, sleep deprivation, airport screeners, safety, health and wellness

Sleepless In The Studio Bar: A New Sleepless Record Set

Looking to break a sleepless record? The competition to beat just got tougher thanks to Tony Wright's miraculous 11-plus days of staying awake. It took more than 40 years for the record to be broken after Randy Gardner's sleepless feat back in 1964. He was 17 at the time and went 264 hours without falling asleep. Now Mr. Wright of Cornwall, England has overtaken him by staying awake for an additional two hours.

People often ask me whether you can sleep deprive yourself to death. Is it possible to keep yourself awake to the point your body just gives out?

Luckily, the answer is no. While it's true that if you deprive yourself of sleep consistently, you can increase your risk for a variety of diseases like cancer, heart disease, obesity, and diabetes, an internal bomb won't go off if you force yourself to stay awake indefinitely. If anything, your foggy mind and inability to concentrate will mean you'll make poor decisions and perhaps jump out in front of a bus or drive your car into a tree.

Both Randy and Tony had to resort to drastic measures to stay awake. Randy took cold showers and listened to loud music; Tony tested his sleepy threshold with a vegetarian diet. Surely it helped to have the support of friends and family, and a world intently watching (Tony had a live web cam set up in a pub called The Studio Bar).

You can check out Tony's adventure by visiting the BBC's website, where you can download his video diary.

Oh, and for the "record," I wouldn't try this at home (or in a pub) if you're hoping to land in the Guinness Book of World Records. Guinness no longer keeps track of sleepless souls.

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: Is Your Fatigue a Sign of Something More?
• WebMD Video: Tired and Sleepless

Technorati Tags: sleepless, records, sleep disorders, health and wellness

Pregnant Women with Apnea at Higher Risk

Photo Credit: Mahalie

In a new study presented at The American Thoracic Society's National meeting, a relationship was discovered that even when obesity was controlled for, mothers that had sleep apnea showed an increased risk of diabetes or hypertension developing during pregnancy.

These amazing results showed that:

When the women's weight was taken into account, sleep apnea was associated with a doubling of the incidence of gestational diabetes and a fourfold increase in the risk of pregnancy-induced hypertension, which includes eclampsia and preeclampsia. According to the Preeclampsia Foundation, eclampsia and preeclampsia are responsible for several hundred women's deaths and more than a thousand fetal deaths annually in the United States.

The mechanisms are still not well understood. It has been hypothesized that since sleep apnea causes these women to stop breathing, a fight or flight mechanism raises the blood pressure enough to get them to wake up. Also during these periods of apnea we see that the body can produce more stress hormones, and the body then produces more glucose and you can see a decrease in insulin sensitivity, which could lead to diabetes.

This could be very stressful on both the mothers and the fetus. Obviously more research is needed to confirm these findings and determine what causes this relationship to occur.

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: Diagnosing Sleep Apnea
• Sleep Problems in Pregnancy

Technorati Tags: sleep, pregnancy, sleep apnea, preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, health and wellness

Sleep Apnea and Car Crashes

In a recent article in Sleep Review it appears as though sleep apnea patients are more likely to have severe car crashes, oftentimes involving injury.

The study compared 800 people with sleep apnea with 800 people that had normal nighttime breathing. Amazingly, patients with even with mild sleep apnea were twice as likely to have a car crash, and three to five times as likely to have a serious crash involving personal injury.

The sleep apnea group had a total of 250 crashes over 3 years, compared with 123 crashes in the group without sleep apnea.

Another interesting fact was that men and women who had apnea were having crashes at the same rate, while in the general population we find that men usually have more car crashes than women. Thus it can be inferred that sleep apnea appears to be an equal opportunity disorder, at least in terms of serious car crashes.

This study was one of the first to look at real sleep studies and motor vehicle accidents, and clearly shows the need to be aware of undiagnosed apnea. The evidence continues to mount that sleep apnea, when undiagnosed, can be fatal.

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• WebMD Video: Personal Story - Sleep Apnea
• Sleep Apnea Death Risks

Technorati Tags: sleep apnea, car accident, health and wellness

Police Officers Have a Higher-Than-Average Incidence of Sleep Disorders

Photo Credit: Andrew Ciscel

New research shows that one third of police officers suffer from sleep disorders. This comes as no surprise given that police are the largest population of shift workers who must find ways to get used to unpredictable, ever-changing schedules. The study, done by Harvard Medical School researchers, collected data from 4,471 officers

Shift workers, such as air traffic controllers or medical trainees, typically have two hours less sleep than other workers, because they are often forced to rotate their shifts over a month's time, and as a result, they have more problems with sleep disorders and health problems like diabetes, heart disease, and psychological issues. In this study, researchers found that 38.4 percent reported having a sleep disorder - sleep apnea being the most common (35.1 percent) and insomnia the second (6.8 percent).

The study brings to light the need for more sleep disorder screening and treatment programs in not only our police departments, but also all of our public health and safety units that employ mainly shift workers. (Or for that matter, any place of work that employs shift workers.) Imagine what this could mean for the well being of our society as a whole.

These sleep deprived officers would do well to treat their sleep disorders and explore ways of reducing the effects of their challenging schedules. For example, taking restorative naps - meaning a nap either 20-35 minutes in length or 90 minutes long, prior to the start of a odd shift, can be very effective. Anything in the 35-90 minute range could actually make them sleepier!

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: Sleep Cycle Struggles
• WebMD Video: Body Clock and Health

Technorati Tags: sleep disorders, police, shift workers, insomnia, health and wellness

Why You Shouldn't Remove Those Mattress Tags!

The International Sleep Products Association's Sleep Products Safety Council is introducing new mattress hangtags to help educate consumers about mattress safety, to coincide with new federal open-flame standards for bedding that took effect July 1.

While the new standards are now in place, that does not mean that mattresses are fire-proof; it means that they will burn more slowly, and less intensely, so that people can get out of their bedroom in case disaster strikes.

The article stated:

The bright yellow hangtags, titled "Don't Go To Sleep Yet...Eight Things You Need to Know About Your Mattress," highlight safety messages regarding smoking, matches, candles, space heaters, electrical cords, sleeping with babies, and the disposal of plastic wrapping and old mattresses.

Take a look at the new tag.

The tag is also in a picture format for non-English speaking consumers. While I had not thought of it earlier, this is a great way for people to be educated on the importance of mattress safety, and I must commend the Council's hard work in getting this initiative passed.

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: Tips for Choosing a Mattress
• Fire Safety Measures

Technorati Tags: sleep, mattress tags, safety, health and wellness