Sleep deprivation becoming a national ailment

Treatment of sleep disorders still restricted mainly to prescriptions for drugs

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One in three Finns suffers from sleep deprivation or from intermittent sleep several times a week.
      Such sleep problems can already be called a national ailment, says researcher Timo Partonen from the National Public Health Institute (KTL).
      According to Partonen, the phenomenon is attributable to changes in working life, in other words to increasingly long and more irregular working hours.
     
Today, sleep disorders are still most frequently treated with medication. However, it is also becoming gradually more common to try to find the underlying cause of such phenomena.
      Vuokko Kuosmanen, the director of the YLE morning TV news, woke up at 3:45 today.
      She started work when copies of Helsingin Sanomat were being delivered to homes at around 4:30 a.m.
     
”Unlike many of my colleagues at YLE, I do not use any sleeping tablets to get rest. Instead, I keep the radio on all night as a soft background. Five hours is enough, if I can take an afternoon nap”, Kuosmanen reports.
      Sometimes a particularly challenging broadcast in prospect can cause her to wake up in panic a couple of hours too early in the morning, causing intermittent sleep.
      As a rule, Kuosmanen has two early wake-ups every week. Getting up at the wrong time is a general topic at YLE.
     
”The most difficult things are getting up and leaving for work. During a broadcast it is easy to stay awake, as the pace is so hectic”, she adds.
      Some of Kuosmanen’s sleep-deprived colleagues suffer from continuous drowsiness, which can create a state in which everything happens as in a slow motion film.
      ”The health centre can give support, but everyone has to find a way to get over the problem by themselves”, Kuosmanen concludes.
     
On the night between next Saturday and Sunday, the country will switch back to winter time and the clocks will be set back by one hour.
      This kind of setting back and forth of clocks every six months could be harmful to health, some Finnish sleep researchers claim.
      Insomnia is a symptom of a sleeping disorder characterized by repeated difficulty in falling asleep, staying asleep, or poor sleep quality.
     
Sleep has a similar effects on the national health to that of exercise, alcohol, or smoking.
      Transient insomnia lasts up to two weeks, while acute insomnia is the inability to consistently sleep well for a period of 2 to 12 weeks. Chronic insomnia lasts more than three months.
     
In addition to traditional medication, Melatonin has proved effective for some insomniacs in treating their sleep disorder. It is not known to create addiction nor the drowsiness associated with the traditional drugs.


Links:
  National Public Health Institute (KTL)

Helsingin Sanomat