Table Of ContentDr Chris Idzikowski, BSc, PhD, FBPsS, is Director of the Sleep Assessment and
Advisory Service. A leading expert on sleep and its disorders, he has served as
Chairman of the British Sleep Society and has been a long-term council member
of the Royal Society of Medicine’s Sleep Medicine Section. Dr Idzikowski has
also sat on the boards of the European Sleep Research Society and the US Sleep
Medicine Foundation. He is the author of five books, including Learn to Sleep
Well (Watkins).
CONTENTS
Author’s acknowledgements
Foreword
Chapter 1: Sleep – an introduction
What is sleep?
What is tiredness?
What is dreaming?
How much sleep do you need?
You and your sleepiness
Chapter 2: The science of sleep
Scientists of sleep
Rhythms of the day and night
The brainwave revolution
Cycles and stages of sleep
The science of dreaming
The genetics of sleep
A memory for sleep
Your body during sleep
Chapter 3: Sleep hygiene – the deep sleep cleanse
The sleep hygiene review
Your sleeping space
Temperature control
Into the darkness
Noise and sleep
Making your bed
Rituals for sleep
The lifestyle factor
Chapter 4: Sleep, ageing and gender
Sleeping babies, rested children
Teens to twenties
Sleep and older age
Sleeping beauty, sleeping lion
Chapter 5: Good sleep guides for workers, parents, dreamers and
more
A worker’s guide to good sleep
A shift worker’s guide to good sleep
A driver’s guide to good sleep
A flyer’s guide to good sleep
An athlete’s guide to good sleep
A performer’s guide to good sleep
A student’s guide to good sleep
A parents’ guide to good sleep
A dreamer’s guide to good sleep
A problem-solver’s guide to good sleep
Chapter 6: Sleep disorders – step by step
Sleep disorders classified
Insomnia: an overview
Adjustment insomnia
Psychophysiological insomnia
Other forms of insomnia
Narcolepsy
Parasomnias
Circadian rhythm sleep disorders
Sleep-related breathing disorders
Restless leg syndrome
Isolated symptoms, normal variants and unresolved issues
Nightmares
Mental disorder and insomnia
Chapter 7: Pills, potions and therapies
Conventional medicine
Sleep centres
Complementary medicine
Gadgets, gizmos and the World Wide Web
Conclusion
Resources
AUTHOR’S ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I’d like to acknowledge simply everyone I’ve worked with – friends, colleagues,
staff, collaborators, students and so on have all contributed to my thinking – but
especially my long-suffering editor Judy Barratt and publisher Bob Saxton.
For Hilary, Liam, Louise, Ophelia, Kim, Dawn and Steve
FOREWORD
Sleep always interests the media but there may be more interest nowadays for
three reasons: 1) The “obesity epidemic” is causing an increase in sleep
disorders. 2) Our informationsensitive, high-performance jobs demand mental
acuity which is blunted by poor sleep and unfortunately 3) sleep weakens as one
grows older.
I’ve often been asked why I became interested in sleep. After all, for most
people sleep is something they barely think about – it comes as a surprise that
anyone should devote their working life to understanding it. The short answer is
that I don’t really remember. I certainly didn’t wake up one day and have an
extraordinary interest in why I had slept the previous eight, nine, ten hours. I do
know, though, that my Latin teacher, my wife, and my late friend and mentor
Emeritus Professor Ian Oswald all had something to do with it. Their teaching
methods, frank criticism of my work and fascinating insights into the human
brain have all inspired me.
Looking after your sleep – and doing it in a way that isn’t harmful (by not
using sleeping pills or alcohol, for example) – is fundamental to your well-being.
This book brings together the essence of everything I’ve learned about sleep in a
way that I hope is practical and accessible. My aim has been to give you not only
information about the nature of sleep, but also guidance on actions you can take
at home to improve your sleep quality. I haven’t shied away from the importance
of conventional medicine in the treatment of sleep disorders (I’m a scientist,
after all), but I hope you’ll see that there are lots of ways in which you can enjoy
better-quality sleep through simple changes to your lifestyle and by performing
simple tasks that promote sleep.
It’s important that you work through the book from the beginning. In Chapters
1 and 2, I’ve offered an understanding of what sleep is and what it does (as far as
we know). Information and simple measures will help you to make your own
assessments of how well you sleep at the moment and how sleepy you are during
the day. By going back to these early assessments when you’ve read later parts
of the book, you can gain a good measure of your progress as you start to
implement my techniques and tips for sleep improvement.
Arguably, the critical chapter in the book is Chapter 3 – the chapter on sleep
hygiene. A safe building is constructed on deep and solid foundations. Sleep
hygiene is the foundation of refreshing sleep. You cannot improve your sleep –
at any level – without making good sleep hygiene your priority. Sleep hygiene
won’t fix broken sleep but it can help prevent sleep breaking.
In Chapters 4 and 5, I’ve looked at some of the specific challenges that we
face for our sleep quality at particular times or stages in our lives, as well as in
particular circumstances.
If you think you have a sleep disorder, Chapter 6 aims to give practical advice
on treatment – I’ve covered major disorders, as well as some of the more
unusual ones. If you have insomnia, I hope to enable you to make informed
choices about your treatment, both at home and with the help of a sleep centre or
a doctor.
An intriguing problem with this chapter was that since the first edition of the
book a new classification of sleep disorders has emerged. Since I started in sleep
40 years ago this is the fourth reclassification. Over that period there have been
many discoveries, like the wakefulnesspromoting brain chemical orexin and
existence of REM behaviour disorder, which is essentially a neurological
disorder which causes patients to act out their dreams. Obesity may be the main
culprit behind obstructive sleep apnoea (not breathing properly during sleep). On
the whole the new classification is a refinement of the older one, so I have made
some adjustments but not many to that chapter. Treatment has changed little,
except perhaps the use of cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia (CBT-I).
Chris Idzikowski, September 2018
Description:Most people in the West fail to get enough sleep, which can contribute to serious health problems. Reading this book, and acting on its advice, could be the single best thing most people can do to boost their health and wellbeing. Lack of sleep is not just a matter of feeling tired. Recent research
