More people than ever, if the increasing number of coffee shops is any indication, are using and depending on caffeine for a morning and/or daytime pick-me-up.

While most parents stop short of giving their children a morning cup of coffee, even young children appear to be consuming more caffeine, so much so that caffeine could be contributing to sleep problems in elementary school. It may also have negative effects on sleep duration, according to the results of a study reported online in the December 16, 2010 issue of the Journal of Pediatrics.

During routine clinical visits at a pediatric clinic in Omaha, parents were asked about their child’s daily consumption of various types of snacks and beverages. Of 228 young children whose parents were surveyed, about three quarters regularly consumed caffeine.

The study revealed that the more caffeine children consumed, the fewer hours they slept on average, the researchers reported online in the Journal of Pediatrics.

The study was originally designed to determine if a link existed between caffeine consumption and bedwetting; it found no evidence of such a link. But the study revealed that about 25% of the children ages five to eight slept less than the nine hours a night recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And the average amount of sleep for all the kids aged eight to twelve was 8.47 hours a night, indicating a sleep deficit for many of those children.

Unlike older teens, who are likely drinking coffee to wake up in the mornings for school, the assumption is that younger kids are getting most of their caffeine from soda, noted Schneider, who serves as a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Nutrition. Nearly all the caffeine intake was consumed through beverages. Few children got a meaningful amount of caffeine from food.

The parent survey revealed that kids seven and younger consumed an average of 52 mg of caffeine a day. Children aged eight and older consumed about 109 mg a day—roughly the amount found in a cup of coffee or three 12-ounce cans of soda.

The study authors note that 109 mg caffeine daily is almost twice the amount recommended by Canadian pediatric guidelines and in excess of the amount shown to create physiological effects in adults.

Children in the study had an average intake two or three times higher than the 22- to 23-mg daily average reported nearly a decade ago, they noted.

“There’s really no role for caffeine in kids,” Marcie Schneider, MD, of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, emphasized in commenting on the study. “We know that caffeine raises your blood pressure, raises your heart rate, and can be addictive.”

“Caffeine’s diuretic properties have encouraged behavioral health practitioners to eliminate caffeine from the diet of children with enuresis,” the researchers noted. However, they found that intake didn’t correlate with the number of nights a child wet the bed. Overall, enuresis was actually less likely in children who consumed caffeine.

“The Food and Drug Administration has not developed pediatric guidelines for caffeine consumption, but Canadian guidelines recommend that children aged 4 to 6 years old consume no more than 45 mg/d, approximately equivalent to the amount of caffeine found in a 12-ounce can of cola

“Parents should be aware of the potentially negative influence of caffeine on a child’s sleep quality and daily functioning,” Dr. Rinn, Medical Director of United Sleep Medicine advises.

The authors of the study, noted their small study does not definitively prove that caffeine consumption causes a decrease in sleep, “but given the potential effects of caffeine on childhood behavior, a screen of caffeine consumption might be beneficial when evaluating childhood behavioral health concerns,” they wrote.

If your child is having sleep issues including insomnia, nightmares, sleepwalking, bed-wetting, or other problems, call the sleep specialists at United Sleep Medicine today. Better nights mean better days for everyone involved!

• Routine good quality sleep decreases how hard your heart has to work, which means blood pressure and heart rate go down at night.
• People who are sleep-deprived demonstrate less variability in their heart rate, meaning that instead of fluctuating normally, the heart rate usually stays elevated. And that can make your body thinks you are in stress.
• Lack of sleep can increase insulin resistance, a risk factor for type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
• Shortened sleep can increase CRP, or C-reactive protein, which is released with stress and inflammation. If your CRP is high, you could be at risk for cardiovascular and heart disease.
• Shortened sleep also interferes with appetite regulation, so you may end up eating more or eating foods that are less healthy for your heart.

But if you’ve received lovely candy in a heart-shaped box, enjoy. Just be sure to get your ZZZ’s!

A circadian rhythm is a roughly 24-hour cycle in the physiological processes of living beings, including plants, animals, fungi and cyanobacteria. In a strict sense, circadian rhythms are endogenously (originating from within an organism) generated, However, this internal rhythm is affected by outside sources such as artificial light, sun rise and time zones. And when one’s circadian rhythm is disrupted by, for example, jet lag, sleeping and eating patterns can get off kilter.

All humans are diurnal—meaning that we are active during the day. Before sunup, our circadian rhythm starts getting us ready for the day by increasing our steroid level, increasing our blood pressure, dropping our melatonin levels and raising our body temperature. But the genetic and biochemical differences among individuals mean that this process can start later or earlier for some people than others.

Circadian rhythms work at the molecular level to “turn on” or “turn off” the expression of proteins controlling the bodily functions that make you sleepy or awake. Light is the main cue influencing circadian rhythms, turning on or turning off genes that control an organism’s internal clocks.

Are circadian rhythms the same thing as biological clocks?

Circadian rhythms are not the same as biological clocks, but they are related. Our biological clocks drive our circadian rhythms. The biological clocks that control circadian rhythms are groupings of interacting molecules in cells throughout the body. A master clock in the brain coordinates all the body clocks so that they are in synch.

The master clock that controls circadian rhythms consists of a group of nerve cells in the brain called the suprachiasmatic nucleus, or SCN. The SCN contains about 20,000 nerve cells and is located in the hypothalamus, the area of the brain just above where the optic nerves cross.

That master clock, or SCN, controls the production of melatonin, a hormone that makes you sleepy. Since SCN is located just above the optic nerves, which relay information from the eyes to the brain, the SCN receives information about incoming light. When there is less light—like at night—the SCN tells the brain to make more melatonin so you get drowsy.

How do circadian rhythms affect body function?

Circadian rhythms are important in determining human sleep patterns. Circadian rhythms can change sleep-wake cycles, hormone release, body temperature and other important bodily functions.

Circadian rhythms have been linked to various sleep disorders, such as insomnia and disrupted sleep-wake cycles. Abnormal circadian rhythms have also been associated with depression, bipolar disorder and seasonal affective disorder (SAD).

Understanding what makes our biological clocks tick may lead researchers to treatments for sleep disorders, jet lag and other health problems such as those above. Learning more about the genes responsible for circadian rhythms will also enhance our understanding of biological systems and the human body.

If you run 10Ks or swim competitively, you’re used to racing against the clock. But you may be overlooking another timekeeper that plays a key role in athletic performance: your body’s circadian rhythms. Nearly every physical attribute, from strength to flexibility, grows more potent over the course of a day, with most peaking between 3 and 6 P.M., says sleep expert and athletic consultant Roger Smith, D.O., of Palo Alto, California. For example, anaerobic capacity—the bursts of power we use to sprint short distances or bench press weights—is 8 percent higher around dinnertime than it is at breakfast. For the competitive-minded, an improvement of this sort could easily mean the difference between a personal best and just another sweaty workout.

Smith looked back at 25 years of Monday Night Football games and found that West Coast teams beat their eastern rivals 63 percent of the time. His interpretation: Since Monday night games always begin at 9 P.M. Eastern time, East Coast teams are playing well after their late afternoon prime. But West Coast players—whose body clocks read 6 P.M. at the opening kickoff—are still at

Of course, you probably don’t cross time zones for your weekly tennis match. But what if it’s scheduled for early morning, when strength and quickness are at their daily lows? One study suggests that regularly training at the same time of day you’ll be competing—whether morning, noon, or night—may enhance performance.

From: http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/199703/time-is-your-side

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/199703/time-is-your-side

There are literally thousands of these applications, or apps, available for download. Once you start searching for “sleep apps” you may be surprised how many are out there that in one way or another relate to sleep.

There are a variety of alarm clocks as well as sound machines that are meant to produce sleep-inducing background noise such as calming streams, rainstorms, or crickets chirping.

There are apps designed to serve as sleep diaries to log your hours of slumber. And once you download to your phone or other personal device, then you have these apps on hand whenever you need them.

Some smart phone and smart device apps claim to record your movements all night and then chart your sleep phases in the morning. Some even have alarm clocks that wake you up in a “light” phase of sleep so that you feel refreshed instead of groggy.

Steven M. Scharf, director of the University of Maryland’s Sleep Disorders Center in Baltimore, says that the products are based on motion-sensitive devices called accelerometers – less-sophisticated versions of the technology he uses to track patients’ sleep. (He also analyzes brain waves and breathing.)

“Perhaps these are useful for estimating sleep time, but their usefulness in estimating sleep stages is probably limited,” Scharf says.

One such app, Sleep Cycle, is much less expensive than other gadgets, but it’s compatible only with the iPhone or iPod Touch. Sleep Cycle uses those devices’ built-in accelerometers – the technology that allows people to use their iPhones as steering wheels or light sabers in games – to track motion during the night. The user is instructed to leave the iPhone or iPod on the corner of the mattress, near the pillow. (People who feel uncomfortable having the iPhone emitting its small dose of radiation next to their heads all night may set the phone to flight mode.)

Sleep Cycle claims to wake people at an optimal phase of sleep within a preselected wake-up window. The “intelligent snooze” feature lets the sleeper snooze for shorter and shorter periods until the alarm time.

And as road accidents get more and more fatal, studies show that tiredness of the driver is a common reason for some of these accidents. An iPhone app has come up with a solution to this problem. Anti Sleep Pilot (ASP) aims at helping driver to avoid accidents and as far as we can tell, the first app of its kind. This app is exclusively designed in a way to calculate driver’s fatigue level and suggest him/her to take break while driving. But a word of caution—if you notice you are drowsy while driving, pull over when it is safe and take necessary steps to refresh. If it is a consistent problem, make an appointment with a sleep specialist as soon as possible.

Many of these apps seem to be of most benefit for entertainment purposes but there are also a few that may directly improve your sleep. Most importantly, having an app around might prompt you to place a special importance on your sleep. This may be a big stride in helping you to sleep better.

For the best and safest approach to your sleep app selection, get advice and treatment for your sleep issues from a sleep specialist. Contact United Sleep Medicine for a consultative appointment today.

Do you use any apps or gadgets to track your sleep? If so, please share your experience with us.

The United Sleep Medicine Insomnia Clinic, as the only multi-disciplinary clinic in this region completely focused on helping those dealing with Insomnia, is one of the only insomnia-focused clinics in the Charlotte, NC region. We offer patients a treatment plan that includes behavioral therapy and holistic approaches, in lieu of traditional medicine.

United Sleep Medicine Insomnia Clinic has a unique approach for the chronically sleep deprived. Our program helps people teach themselves how to quiet their minds and get the rest they so desperately need and want.  

The Program:

• Initial consultation with Board Certified Sleep Physician
• Complete physical exam
• 6-8 week program with our sleep trained Cognitive Behavioral Specialist
• Complete individualized treatment plan
• Follow-up and continued support
•  Group therapy for those interested

This approach to treating insomnia is clinically proven to produce the best possible outcomes and more nights of sound, restful sleep.

The insomnia clinic is located at:

5821 Fairview Road, Ste 409

Charlotte, NC 28209

Please feel free to call us with your questions, more information or for a referral at 704-377-5337.

A recent study conducted at the University of Michigan has linked bullying in elementary-age children to sleep deprivation.

Children who bully or show aggressive, disruptive behavior at school were twice as likely to suffer from sleep deprivation—from sleep disorders like snoring or daytime sleepiness — probably because their nighttime sleep is disrupted or inadequate, according this study published online May 31 in Sleep Medicine.

“Sleep problems, but not necessarily sleep apnea, were twice as common in the children with poor behavior,” lead study author Louise O’Brien, PhD, from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, told Medscape Medical News.

The researchers recruited 341 children in elementary school grades 2 to 5 in Ypsilanti, a city in southeast Michigan. About 30% of children live below the poverty line, and 58% qualify for school lunch assistance. The population is 63% African American and 30% white. Of these children, 110 (32%) were rated by a parent or teacher as having a conduct problem on the Conner’s’ parent rating scale or the Conner’s’ teacher rating scale.

Sleepy children more likely to have conduct problems

Children with conduct problems were more likely to have sleep-disordered breathing compared with children without conduct problems. However, when investigators looked more closely, they found that snoring per se was not associated with conduct problems but that the degree of sleepiness was. “Sleepiness, whether or not related to sleep-disordered breathing, could underlie a sizeable portion of aggressive behaviors within urban public schools,” Dr. O’Brien said.

“Kids can be sleepy for many reasons other than having sleep apnea,” she said in an interview. “They can be sleepy because of not getting enough sleep at night, because of chaotic schedules, playing electronic devices, cell phones, computer games in bed when they’re supposed to be sleeping.”

The sleep specialists at United Sleep Medicine agree, saying it makes a lot of sense. Any parent knows their children act out when they miss a good night’s sleep. But when sleep deprivation becomes long-term, serious difficulties may arise if the child is not treated by a sleep physician.

The recommendation for sleep in elementary school children is 10 to 11 hours per night, but in our experience at United Sleep Medicine, it is painfully evident that many children may be getting by with much less.

As additional evidence, the children in the study were usually also suffering from ADHD or aggressive behavior, but when they awoke after having a full night’s rest, their behavior improved immensely.

Consider Sleep Problems

In the meantime, school and pediatric clinicians should consider a sleep source in all children with behavior problems and screen for sleep apnea and insufficient sleep.

Impaired sleep affects the brain, says O’Brien, and if that’s disrupted, “emotional regulation and decision-making capabilities are impaired.” But, she cautions that the association between sleep problems and poor behavior doesn’t prove that bullying is caused by sleep problems. There are likely many more pieces to the puzzle that can put an end to bullying. Getting kids to bed and getting more sleep is certainly a step in the right direction.

Beauty Sleep

The idea of beauty rest is ingrained in popular culture, but it’s apparently never been put to the test by science until recently. In a study published less than a year ago in the British Medical Journal, researcher John Axelsson and his team at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm found that sleep-deprived individuals appear less healthy, more tired, and less attractive than those who have received a full night’s worth of sleep.

Could it be that the idea of “beauty sleep” is not just a fairy tale? While the long-term effects of poor sleep on overall health have been widely researched, this beauty sleep experiment is the first study to provide evidence that in the short term, sleep deprivation does in fact show up as a discernible change in facial appearance.

 Subjects photographed before and after sleep deprivation

In the study, 23 healthy adults from ages 18 to 31 were first photographed after eight hours of sleep, wearing no makeup. The same adults were photographed again after sleeping only five hours and being kept awake for a full 31 hours, with the same lighting and camera settings.

The photos were rated by 65 untrained observers who graded the images in these three categories—how healthy, attractive, and tired the individuals appeared. On the whole, the participants were judged to look worse after sleep deprivation, in all categories, and the scientists believe the effects would be even more dramatic in person, when factors like blink rate and drowsiness could be observed.

The Swedish research team says its findings have implications beyond looking good. Axelsson said that the findings could be important for doctors, who should familiarize themselves with the sleep history of a patient to provide a more precise diagnosis.

Recent research points to the importance of a good night’s sleep for overall health. Over the years, studies have found links between poor sleep and Alzheimer’s disease, heart disease, hypertension, depression, and even weight gain.

Mirror, mirror on the wall

Sleep does appear to lessen the severity of wrinkles in the face and neck, at least temporarily. Part of this is due to a decline in body temperature and a shift in body position. The body cools in anticipation of bedtime (about half a degree) and to do so, the circulatory system increases blood flow to the skin. This is why the cheeks often flush at night. This is why some people appear more radiant just before bedtime or during sleep.

While you sleep, the shift in body position—lying down—diverts the force of gravity. But there’s more to beauty sleep than that—otherwise just lying down to rest in the middle of the day would have the same effect. During sleep the whole body, including the face, perspires more. This moisture on the skin smoothes out wrinkles.

“Sleep is the body’s natural beauty treatment,” Axelsson said. “It’s probably more effective than any other treatment you could buy.”

If you can’t seem to get your beauty sleep, it might be time to see a sleep specialist. The physicians at United Sleep Medicine are ready to help you get you get back to sleep—and back to looking and feeling your best for 2012 and beyond!

More people than ever, if the increasing number of coffee shops is any indication, are using and depending on caffeine for a morning and/or daytime pick-me-up.

While most parents stop short of giving their children a morning cup of coffee, even young children appear to be consuming more caffeine, so much so that caffeine could be contributing to sleep problems in elementary school. It may also have negative effects on sleep duration, according to the results of a study reported online in the December 16, 2010 issue of the Journal of Pediatrics.

During routine clinical visits at a pediatric clinic in Omaha, parents were asked about their child’s daily consumption of various types of snacks and beverages. Of 228 young children whose parents were surveyed, about three quarters regularly consumed caffeine.

The study revealed that the more caffeine children consumed, the fewer hours they slept on average, the researchers reported online in the Journal of Pediatrics.

The study was originally designed to determine if a link existed between caffeine consumption and bedwetting; it found no evidence of such a link. But the study revealed that about 25% of the children ages five to eight slept less than the nine hours a night recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And the average amount of sleep for all the kids aged eight to twelve was 8.47 hours a night, indicating a sleep deficit for many of those children.

Unlike older teens, who are likely drinking coffee to wake up in the mornings for school, the assumption is that younger kids are getting most of their caffeine from soda, noted Schneider, who serves as a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Nutrition. Nearly all the caffeine intake was consumed through beverages. Few children got a meaningful amount of caffeine from food.

The parent survey revealed that kids seven and younger consumed an average of 52 mg of caffeine a day. Children aged eight and older consumed about 109 mg a day—roughly the amount found in a cup of coffee or three 12-ounce cans of soda.

The study authors note that 109 mg caffeine daily is almost twice the amount recommended by Canadian pediatric guidelines and in excess of the amount shown to create physiological effects in adults.

Children in the study had an average intake two or three times higher than the 22- to 23-mg daily average reported nearly a decade ago, they noted.

“There’s really no role for caffeine in kids,” Marcie Schneider, MD, of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, emphasized in commenting on the study. “We know that caffeine raises your blood pressure, raises your heart rate, and can be addictive.”

“Caffeine’s diuretic properties have encouraged behavioral health practitioners to eliminate caffeine from the diet of children with enuresis,” the researchers noted. However, they found that intake didn’t correlate with the number of nights a child wet the bed. Overall, enuresis was actually less likely in children who consumed caffeine.

“The Food and Drug Administration has not developed pediatric guidelines for caffeine consumption, but Canadian guidelines recommend that children aged 4 to 6 years old consume no more than 45 mg/d, approximately equivalent to the amount of caffeine found in a 12-ounce can of cola

“Parents should be aware of the potentially negative influence of caffeine on a child’s sleep quality and daily functioning,” Dr. Rinn, Medical Director of United Sleep Medicine advises.

The authors of the study, noted their small study does not definitively prove that caffeine consumption causes a decrease in sleep, “but given the potential effects of caffeine on childhood behavior, a screen of caffeine consumption might be beneficial when evaluating childhood behavioral health concerns,” they wrote.

If your child is having sleep issues including insomnia, nightmares, sleepwalking, bed-wetting, or other problems, call the sleep specialists at United Sleep Medicine today. Better nights mean better days for everyone involved!

1. Reserve a Worry About the Holidays Time about 10-15 minutes before bed. Take out a piece of paper and write down your thoughts, transferring them out of your mind.
2. Listen to mediation or relaxation tapes to settle your mind.
3. Go to bed when you are sleepy. Know the holidays can zap you and make you want to go to bed earlier than usual.
4. Get up and do quiet activities, such as reading or just looking at the sparkling lights if you cannot fall asleep within 30 minutes. Staying in bed can only worsen the situation.
5. Avoid caffeine after 4pm, including, coffee, chocolate, tea and soda.
6. Reward yourself by engaging in quiet activities before bed, such as a hot bath and having a wind down time each night.
7. Make sure bed linens and sleeping surfaces are comfortable and clean.
8. Continue or begin to exercise regularly despite the holiday time crunch, but finish at least 3 hours before bedtime.
9. Make your bedroom dark, cool and quiet.
10. Use your bedroom for sleep, removing all electronics (TVs, cell phones, computers) and work materials.

 Remember to discuss any sleeping problems with your doctor as they can lead to more serious life threatening diseases such as high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes.
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