Fact or Fiction: You Can Catch Up on Sleep Over the Weekend

If we're watching our weight and "blow it" on any given day, we're told it's okay because we can make up for it the next day and get back on track. But what about when we lose sleep? Can we catch up over the weekend and, say, sleep in on Sunday morning to make up for those late, late nights during the work week?

I get this question a lot. I think it's because people expect to hear something different from the truth: NO, you can't just pay off a sleep debt by sleeping late on the weekend. Sorry. The proof? Check out the following studies of late, which have changed some of the conventional thinking of many of us in the world of sleep science:

• In 2003, scientists at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research examined the cognitive effects of a week of poor sleep, followed by three days of sleeping at least eight hours a night. The scientists found that the "recovery" sleep did not fully reverse declines in performance on a test of reaction times and other psychomotor tasks, especially for subjects who had been forced to sleep only three or five hours a night.


• In a similar study in 2008, scientists at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm found that when subjects slept four hours a night over five days, and then "recovered" with eight hours a night over the following week, they still showed slight residual cognitive impairments a week later, even though they reported no sleepiness.


• Another study done this year at Walter Reed found that people recovered much more quickly from a week of poor sleep when it was preceded by a "banking" week that included nights with 10 hours of shuteye.

The good news in this latest study, and a change from prior thinking, is that it appears you can prepare for an upcoming sleep debt by banking some hours of sleep. In other words, if you know you have a week of little sleep ahead of you, try loading up on sleep beforehand, not simply afterward. However it should be noted that you are likely only paying off a bit of sleep debt, to bring your reserves back to normal, before depleting them again.

The bad news, of course, is that it's not so easy to pay off a sleep debt in a single night of solid sleep. And the effects of that sleep deprivation can last a lot longer than what you'd imagine. (We all just got an extra hour a few weeks ago when the time changed. How much better off are you today?)

The lesson: avoid chronic sleep deprivation entirely, and when life gets in the way of that goal, then plan for it. Use weekends to prepare for a long work week rather than trying to make up for them.

Sweet Dreams,

Michael J. Breus, PhD
The Sleep Doctor™
www.thesleepdoctor.com

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• Sleep Disorders: Member Discussion
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Pilot Fatigue to Blame?

If you learned upon landing that your plane's pilots had overshot the airport by 150 miles because they fell asleep at the controls, what would you feel?

Terrified?
Shocked?
Lucky?

I'd feel a mix of the above. In this week's latest hit to the airline industry, a Northwest flight to Minneapolis overshot its destination and pilot fatigue could be to blame. Of course, the pilots are saying they were in an argument at the time and that's the reason for the blunder (not that I'd like to see my pilots so distracted over a "debate" that they still overshoot the runway!).

Fatigue among pilots has been a recurring theme this year, punctuated earlier this year by the deadly crash near Buffalo that was partly blamed on fatigue (that crash was blamed on pilot error).

The Federal Aviation Administration is rewriting its rules that govern flight time for pilots and their required rest periods in order to reduce the chances of fatigue. It will be the first update to the rules in decades and will utilize research that wasn't available before.

Does that make me feel better the next time I fly?

A little, maybe. Trouble is, it can be hard to legislate such rules. And sometimes fatigue over a series of poorly slept nights can catch up to you days later. In other words, you could have a sleep-deprived weekend, feel okay on Monday but be a zombie on Tuesday when you're expected to perform - and the lives of countless others are in your hands.

I've written about shift workers a lot in the past. But those who have jobs that put the lives of many others at stake should be scrutinized to a much higher degree. If it's that easy to fall asleep at the controls of an airplane - without the airplane knowing (or its numerous flight attendants!), then I say, let's invent something that can keep check on that. With all the gadgets we have at our disposal today, can't we find one that can alert the crew on a flight when its captain has nodded off?

Just a thought. Now that would make me feel safer in the skies.

Sweet Dreams,

Michael J. Breus, PhD
The Sleep Doctor™
www.thesleepdoctor.com

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• Sleep Disorders: Member Discussion
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Naps Are Exercise for the Brain

Dozing off. Getting some quick shut-eye to beat the afternoon lull. Having a siesta.

It seems I've been talking a lot about naps lately. And the New York Times must have heard me this week, as it reported on a survey about napping. The findings:

• 1 in 3 adults admit to napping on a typical day.
• Napping is high among adults who have trouble sleeping a night or who have worked out in the last 24 hours.
• Unemployed people were more likely to nap during the week.
• Women, those who make less than $20,000 a year, and people dissatisfied with their financial situation were also likely to report having trouble sleeping at night.

Unfortunately, the survey didn't define exactly what constitutes a nap. But I think most people can do that for themselves, even if those definitions vary slightly from person to person. Does nodding off for a few seconds on a commuter bus or subway count? How about putting your head down on your desk for a few minutes while reading? Or do you have to be fully engaged in the sleep-like position on a couch or bed?

Anyone who gets a boost from a brief micro-sleep could be napping. You don't have to be lying down necessarily or in a bedroom with the lights out (though that would be ideal). I know plenty of people who have mastered the art of napping while sitting up or reclining in an office chair.

As the article points out, it's too bad that napping is still bashed by society. Some sleep experts think naps should have the status of exercise and I agree! They make us feel stronger, happier, and able to perform better.

What I don't like about this recent survey is that its results somehow imply that you have to have trouble sleeping at night or be dissatisfied about work to embrace naps and see them as positive contributors to health. That's clearly not so. Whether you are:

• happy or sad,
• financially fit or troubled,
• employed or out of work,
• an insomniac or sound sleeper, or
• a man or a woman

all of us can learn how to nap and reap its many rewards!

After all, naps were recently proven to be more effective than a cup of joe at tackling that afternoon lull. Sleep up, don't drink up.

Sweet Dreams,
Michael J. Breus, PhD, DABSM
The Sleep Doctor

This article about sleep is also available at Dr. Breus's official blog, The Insomnia Blog.

Fido or Tabby Got Your Sleep?

If you're still scratching your head wondering why you're not feeling as refreshed as you should in the morning, you may have overlooked a little furry sleep thief: your pet.

I get asked about pets in the bedroom pretty frequently, and it can be a hard to hear that pets in the bedroom can be problematic for sleep. Pets are like family members, and we don't like to exclude them from snuggling with us when they show so much affection and beg to be with us at night. But they can be a major cause of poor and disrupted sleep.

Studies have demonstrated that a reasonable percentage of pet owners who allow their pets in bed have sleep problems. And if you think a cat is harmless, then look no further than a home video of what goes on in night when you think your furry friend acts like a stuffed animal. If only...

For starters, cats are nocturnal by nature. They typically won't snooze with you for 7 or 8 hours straight. They may look harmless when you’re about to drift off, but a cat usually will get up, move around, play, and try to rouse you.

Dogs aren't quite so nocturnal, but because of their size, every time they move or begin to scratch and groom themselves they can wake the soundest sleeper. They can also snore as badly as a human -- ever listen to an Old English Bulldog?

How about a cat or dog bed? If you've already introduced your pet to your own bed, then it's going to be pretty hard to get it to use its own special bed--no matter what the person at the pet store said or how fancy, fluffy, and "pet-friendly" the bed is. Fido and Tabby may turn their noses up at that and be in your bed faster than you can snap your fingers. To this end, let me offer some tips:

• Everyone has a different tolerance level for pets in the bedroom, so both bed partners must agree on who gets to sleep where. If pets don't disturb anyone's sleep, then there's usually no harm.


• Understand that once you allow pets to share your bed, it becomes difficult to curb or stop the habit. To stop the habit, you'll have to endure some heart-wrenching complaints from Fido or Fluffy until they learn that your bedroom is off limits.


• Make sure that your intimacy needs do not suffer from sharing your bed with pets. Remember the bed is for both sleep and sex; do not trade one for the other.


• Have your allergies checked. Over time it's quite easy to develop allergies to pets and not realize it. If you wake with a stuffy nose every day, it could be time to find Fido or Fluffy its own space.


• Review the habits of your beloved pet to make sure they're compatible with yours: a snoring bulldog can be a bigger problem than you might think.

The good news is pets can't hold grudges the way humans can. So even though you may have to practice some tough love for a while, you won't risk losing your best friend.

Sweet Dreams,

Michael J. Breus, PhD, FAASM
The Sleep Doctor

This article about sleep is also available at Dr. Breus's official blog, The Insomnia Blog.

Related Topics:

• WebMD Video: Pets in the Bed: Is It Bad?
• Sinus, Snoring, Sleep Apnea: Jordan S. Josephson, MD
• Sleep Disorders: Member Discussion
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Not Fit to Fly

Photo Credit: Josh Hallett

It's hard to legislate sleep. As an employer you can certainly set rules and guidelines, hoping your employees show up refreshed and ready to perform, but you can't really enforce or police it - even when lives depend on it.

Hearing about the fatigue factor involved in Continental's February plane crash on a cold, icy night near Buffalo, New York has been horrifying. According to the latest reports from the NTSB, the main cause of the crash is being blamed on the crew's lack of experience and lack of sleep (lack of proper conduct in the cockpit, too, which certainly stems from a lack of experience and sleep).

Have you ever wondered:

• When you step on to a plane, how alert are your pilots?


• Have they just gotten off a transcontinental flight and haven't slept in a day - or two?


• Have they been working the graveyard shift and catching some Zs on a couch in the terminal before taking control of your plane?


• Are they feeling fuzzy and spacey as they continue to fight a nagging cold bug (which really prefers them to be sleeping more)?


• How much does sleep factor into performance...even when an emergency happens suddenly?

To quickly answer that last question, sleep plays a huge role in the ability to perform, even when it comes to basic skills we've done over and over again. And thinking about our pilots' alertness is probably not something that enters our minds as we're boarding planes and getting organized in our seats, but the thoughts are crossing millions of grounded minds this week as more news emerges about the fate of that February ride.

The history books are loaded with similar stories: 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 (National Roads and Motorists Association) estimates fatigue is involved in one in 6 fatal road accidents. In fact, 17 hours of sustained wakefulness leads to a decrease in performance equivalent to a blood alcohol-level of 0.05%. Too bad "sleepy driving" doesn't have the same buzz to it as "drunk driving."

Sorry, but sleep deprivation - regardless of your job - is not a badge of honor. Pilots aside, think of all the jobs that rely on alertness in critical, potentially life-threatening scenarios: ER doctors, surgeons, ground transportation drivers, air-traffic controllers, freight train engineers, etc. The sad part is the challenge of ensuring our pilots, drivers, controllers, and so forth are indeed fit to be at the helm. What can we do?

• Have them keep journals of their sleep/wake cycles?


• Invent a test they can take to measure their alertness prior to clocking in?


• Enforce stricter guidelines for when, say, a pilot, can be in the cockpit after a certain stretch of wakefulness?

It's all a hotly contested debate. No one is perfect. But we demand perfection in certain situations when the lives of people are at stake. May this recent incident and ongoing investigation shed a brighter light on the importance of sleep hygiene and the value of ensuring our public servants get all the sleep they need.

Sweet Dreams,

Michael J. Breus, PhD, FAASM
The Sleep Doctor

This article on sleep is also available at Dr. Breus's official blog, The Insomnia Blog.

Related Topics:

• Sinus, Snoring, Sleep Apnea: Jordan S. Josephson, MD
• Sleep Disorders: Member Discussion
• Get the Sleep Well newsletter in your inbox weekly