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Quantity vs Quality - How much sleep do you really need?
Daytime sleepiness, poor attention span, irritability, low mood, short temper, argumentative, low tolerance, sugar cravings are all symptoms of poor sleep health. When we sleep, our bodies repair cells, strengthen the immune system, and restore energy levels.
Good quality deep sleep is often the best way to help you cope with stress, solve problems, or recover from illness; naturally. But how much sleep do we need nightly for optimum health and vitality?
According to the Sleep Health Foundation, the amount of sleep required is determined by your age:
Although eight hours is the number most often associated with a full night's sleep for adults, sleep experts know there is some degree of variation when it comes to individual sleep needs.
Dr Sudhansu Chokroverty, program director for clinical neurophysiology and sleep medicine at the New Jersey Neuroscience Institute at JFK Medical Centre says, "the amount of sleep needed [by adults] varies from individual to individual, and is determined genetically and hereditarily. Many people can function with 6 hours sleep, and there also some who need 9 hours or more."
While Professor Jim Horne of the Sleep Research Centre at Loughborough University says, "simply judging sleep merely by its duration rather than its quality is like judging the nutritious value of food we eat merely on its weight."
What is Deep Restorative Sleep and How Do We Attain It?
Sleep is prompted by natural cycles of activity in the brain and consists of two basic states:
1. rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, and
2. non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep.
During the deep stages of NREM sleep, the body repairs and regenerates the tissues, it builds bone, as well as muscles. And it also appears to strengthen the immune system.
NREM sleep moves through 4 progressively deeper stages:
Stage 1: Sleep study (polysomnography) readings show a reduction in activity between wakefulness and stage 1 sleep. The eyes are closed and a person can be awakened without difficulty. However, if aroused from this stage of sleep, a person may feel as if he or she has not slept. Stage 1 may last for five to 10 minutes. Many may notice the feeling of falling during this stage of sleep, which may cause a sudden muscle contraction (called hypnic myoclonia).
NOTE: a person suffering sleep disordered breathing (SDB), presenting in the way of snoring and/or sleep apnoea, will more than likely have several light micro-sleeps during the night. Their sleep stage will not progress deeper than NREM stage 1 due to the body's natural survival response fight or flight.
The response involuntarily arouses the sufferer constantly in order to resume breathing (see Diagram 1). This results in a feeling of tiredness when waking in the morning although the SDB sufferer has just spent the last 8 hours in bed. Click the blue link to read more about Sleep Studies (polysomnogram)
Stage 2: This is a period of light sleep during which sleep study readings show intermittent peaks and valleys, or positive and negative waves. These waves indicate spontaneous periods of muscle tone mixed with periods of muscle relaxation. The heart rate slows and the body temperature decreases. At this point, the body prepares to enter deep sleep.
Stages 3 and 4: These stages are known as slow-wave, or delta, sleep. They are both deep sleep stages, with stage 4 being more intense than Stage 3. If aroused from sleep during these stages, a person may feel disoriented for a few minutes. Each stage can last from 5 to 15 minutes. A completed cycle of sleep consists of a progression from stages 1-4 before REM sleep is attained, then the cycle starts over again.
A SDB sufferer has no chance of attaining deep restorative NREM sleep, let alone REM sleep, as their body's natural fight or flight survival response arouses them several times a night by way of the adrenal medulla releasing hormones (catecholamines) to shock the SDB sufferer awake in order to resume breathing.
In essence, a person suffering SDB can have several light micro-sleeps during the night (no deeper than NREM stage 1,) resulting in a feeling of tiredness although they have just spent the last 8 hours in bed. As well as many other degenerative health consequences such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and stroke (to name only a few). Instead of receiving good quality deep restorative sleep recommended by leading sleep neuroscientists.
The Severity of Sleep Disordered Breathing
The only professionally recognised (Medicare approved) way to accurately assess the severity of SDB is by undergoing a diagnostic sleep study (polysomnogram). Professional grade sleep study technology monitors your breathing patterns and stoppages, cardiac activity, brain activity, limb movement, sleeping position, blood oxygen levels and much more. Inferior ‘screening devices’ monitor only 2 or 4 signals which compromises your data results and can lead to inaccurate diagnosis and treatment.
An ‘in home’ diagnostic sleep study using a 10 channel monitoring system can now be professionally conducted in the comfort and privacy of your own home - Australia wide.
If you are uncertain whether a sleep study is required, Sleep Clinic Services offer a convenient online sleep self-assessment questionnaire to help determine whether a sleep study is necessary. Once submitted, a friendly professional Sleep Therapist will review your data, then contact you to explain your results. The Sleep Therapist will also answer any questions and discuss treatment solutions available to you, obligation free.
Sleep is the best medicine. Even Professor Jim Horne agrees, just like we eat and drink in excess for pleasure, "we also sleep for pleasure beyond necessity," so perhaps we should endeavour to enjoy that 7.8 in its entirety, a happy mind is a healthier mind after all.
DISCLAIMER - INFORMATION PROVIDED IN THIS ARTICLE IS GENERAL IN CONTENT AND SHOULD NOT BE SEEN AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR PROFESSIONAL MEDICAL ADVICE.
READ WHAT OTHER PATIENTS THINK:
Michael Hicks - "You literally saved my life!"
Jim Goldring - "I was going for periods of up to 1min 17secs without breathing!"
Belinda Skinner - "The results of my home sleep study were very prompt and explained in great detail"
References and further reading: