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• The Quest for Ideal Sleep by Dan Rockwell on May 21, 2008

  Working in research has a funny way of making you say “D’oh!” sometimes, like Homer Simpson. 

  Last year I worked on a study for Respironics, a company that makes devices for people who have trouble sleeping.  One facet of the project was to figure out what “ideal sleep” was all about. It was fun study; we talked to lots of people who sleep just fine, versus those who don’t. We talked to people about their sleep rituals—how they prepare for good night’s sleep—and it was fascinating to help them express how good sleep feels. 

  Respironic’s customers deal with a condition called sleep apnea, a growing problem that afflicts thousands of people every day. If you snore, are overweight, or have been known to wake up with headaches or fall asleep in traffic, you may have sleep apnea. Respironics’s CPAP machine helps people deal with apnea by creating continuous positive airways pressure, which is a key to sleeping better. 

  Anyway, the study went well—we uncovered some great data and it really helped Respironics. All said and done, right? Wrong!
  About eight months after the project, my own doctor suggested that I get tested for sleep apnea.  Now, I’m a big guy, snore, and yeah, I do occasionally have a headache when I wake up, but I’ve never fallen asleep in traffic. Regardless, after a few nights in sleep study lab, I did a classic “D’oh!” when I saw the results. I had sleep apnea all along, and never realized it. 

  So I’m now in the process (or “quest” as I call it) to find ideal sleep. The most compelling part of the experience so far—aside from sleeping great using the CPAP device—was seeing my data from the sleep lab. It was presented in really nice charts and graphs that let me see at a glance how I poorly slept and how I struggled. The data-obsessed kid in me was thrilled. 

  For me, sleeping with the CPAP device is simply amazing. No more headaches, no snoring, and the device is pretty quite at night. There are some challenge in finding the perfect fit (you sleep with it placed over your nose and mouth), but the results of great sleep far, far outweigh it.  Ideal sleep can be had; my quest is nearly complete.

  If any of these symptoms sound familiar, be sure to visit Sleep Apnea.

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