Researchers at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, Canada, have characterized the structure of normal sleep. The findings of the study “Normal Polysomnography Parameters in Healthy Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis” have been published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.

“Many of us believe that as we age, we lose sleep,” says Mark Boulos, MD, sleep neurologist at Sunnybrook and the study’s lead author, in a release. “What we discovered is that as people get older, their sleep doesn’t change dramatically.”

Brian Murray, MD, head of neurology at Sunnybrook, conceptualized the study. He says, “One very interesting finding is that the percentage of deep and dreaming sleep remains remarkably constant in healthy people over their lifespan.”

The researchers reviewed data from 169 published sleep studies that collectively examined 5,273 healthy adult participants.

“We looked at various sleep parameters, for example, how long it took a person to fall asleep, and the duration of different stages of sleep,” says Boulos. “Using our study data, we were able to determine the impact of age and sex on the various sleep

Cleveland Clinic researchers study links between seizure frequency and insomnia severity.

By Lisa Spear

People with epilepsy are more likely than the general population to have insomnia and sleep apnea. The daytime sleepiness associated with both of these conditions could potentially aggravate the neurological condition, leading to more seizures throughout the day and night, diminishing the quality of life for people who live with this disorder. So why not screen every neurological patient for sleep disorders and treat them accordingly?

This is a question that the Cleveland Clinic’s director of the Sleep Disorders Center Nancy Foldvary-Schaefer, DO, MS, a neurologist and sleep specialist, will likely ask during her presentation at the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) meeting in May.

She will be presenting an abstract that she and a team of researchers from the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio wrote, looking at a correlation between the number of seizures per month that people with epilepsy experience and their insomnia severity.

It’s important work that provides evidence that perhaps insomnia symptoms can directly impact seizure control in people with epilepsy and, therefore,

A Diplomate shares his management, marketing, and networking advice.

By Kenneth A. Mogell, DMD, DABDSM

There are many models that dentists can follow to integrate dental sleep medicine into their practices. My journey into dental sleep medicine is probably not much different than others, but I hope by sharing some of my experiences, other dentists will be better able obtain the personal and professional achievement that dental sleep medicine can bring.

I have reaped health benefits; I no longer spend the entire day contorting my neck and back doing crowns, implants, and other general dentistry procedures. My staff and my family benefit from the additional revenue the services bring to the practice. And of course, patients receive much-needed treatment for a medical disorder—and the potential to lead more fulfilling lives.

Target Market: Current Patients

An early decision to make is who your target market will be. Will you focus on existing patients? Should you design a social media program that will attract new patients? Or maybe you will decide to develop the model I chose, which is to focus on

Obese people with sleep apnea may live longer when they use a CPAP machine to help keep their airways open while they sleep, a recent study suggests.

After following obese patients with sleep apnea for about 11 years, researchers found those who used the nighttime breathing aid were 42 percent less likely than those who didn’t use the devices to die of any cause.

Apnea that isn’t properly treated has been linked with excessive daytime sleepiness, heart attacks, heart failure and an increased risk of premature death.

“In patients with sleep apnea, there is a poor oxygenation of the body during sleep,” said lead study author Dr. Quentin Lisan of the Paris Cardiovascular Research Center in France.

“This has several consequences, including increased risk of cardiovascular diseases,” Lisan said by email. “PAP therapy allows a better oxygenation of the body during sleep, hence lowering the risk of these associated conditions, which in turn might decrease mortality.”

Get the full story at www.reuters.com

A new study finds that treating the overproduction of one hormone may be a way to help a subset of the millions of Americans who suffer from obstructive sleep apnea, reports the University of California-San Francisco.

Researchers at UC San Francisco have found that treating a condition in the adrenal glands causing an excess of aldosterone, a hormone that maintains electrolyte balance and blood pressure, may be an effective way to help people reduce the risk of obstructive sleep apnea.

UCSF endocrine surgeons Insoo Suh, MD, and Quan-Yang Duh, MD, didn’t set out to study sleep apnea. Suh and Duh specialize in the treatment of primary aldosteronism, a disease in which one or both of the adrenal glands overproduce the hormone aldosterone, and were looking into the question of whether this hormone plays a role in obesity. Obesity is a major factor in obstructive sleep apnea, which meant that many of the surgeons’ patients were living with that condition as well.

Get the full story at www.ucsf.edu

Sleep apnea doesn’t only affect middle-aged men, reports Health.com.

Prior to being tested, I had never considered or even discussed the possibility of sleep apnea with my doctor. My doctor doubted that I needed a sleep test because I was so young. It was a surprise to me that this had never been looked into as a diagnosis for me, but I guess it is just that uncommonly diagnosed.

Get the full story at www.health.com