Iowa Sleep Blog

The end of Daylight Saving Time tends to be more exciting than the beginning, since we gain an extra hour of sleep. "Falling back" can be helpful in many ways, including our daily schedules. The slight shift of the clock means the sun will rise earlier in the mornings, which can make it easier to get up in the morning, but it can also throw off your routine for a couple days, too. Gaining…

Everyone has an internal clock called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (or SCN for short).Like all clocks it turns on and off-- resulting in periods of wake and sleep. Some clocks are delayed. This genetic condition is called Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome (DSPS). It causes a problem. The individual can’t get to bed at a regular time and can’t get out of bed at a regular time. …

By Vicki Richmond, RPSGT, Technical Director Home sleep testing is becoming popular with patients and and more insurance companies require them, rather than in laboratory testing as a starting point. Home sleep tests are capable of diagnosing sleep apnea, but are unable to diagnose other sleep disorders like narcolepsy, parasomnias, and sleep movement disorders. The question…

Dr. Meir Kryger (Co-author of Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine) once told me that in 1970 – Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) was considered so rare that he was asked to give a grand rounds on it to his medical school. It was then considered a rare disease of fat old men. NO LONGER. Science has improved. OSA is a genetic problem. It occurs in men, women, and…

Summer is almost here, which means kids will be out of school and family vacations will be underway. To make sure you have enough energy to enjoy the sights, activities and long hours that come with vacations (or long meetings that come with business travel), it’s important to make sure you’re getting quality sleep every night. For people with sleep apnea, traveling with a CPAP can seem…

While it might seem easier to push through a hard week or month at work or school by staying late working or studying extra hours, you are actually doing more harm than good. Last month, NPR did a report on how sleeplessness impacts workers and the workplace. They found that, when sleep deprived, you’re grouchier and more error-prone, which isn’t great for you or your employer. Sleep…

Sleep. It’s one of those things we dreaded as children, look forward to as adults, and is absolutely essential to allow our bodies to function at their highest level. But, it’s not always easy to convince young children to go down for a nap or get ready for bed each night. By the time a child turns two, most have spent more time sleeping than awake. According the National…

May is the Better Sleep Council’s Better Sleep Month, which helps bring focus and attention to the important role sleeping well plays into leading healthy, productive lives. To celebrate sleeping well every night, we put together some of our favorite tips to sleeping well to kick off the month. The whole list is below, but follow along with us on Facebook and Twitter…

In the busy lives of people in the U.S., the phrase, “you can sleep when you’re dead” is used all too often. In reality, sleep is an extremely important part of keeping our bodies operating in tip-top shape. It’s pretty easy to tell the difference between how you feel after a good night’s sleep, and how you feel when you’ve been burning the midnight oil. Many people, especially…

There’s probably at least one person in your family, be it your dad, a grandparent or even an aunt, that everyone makes fun of for snoring, sleep talking, or being an insomniac. But did you know that some of those sleep disorders could be familial? Researchers are conducting more studies to find links between the sleep disorders and patterns of parents and their children, as…