 | | | | Related Healthscout Videos | |
|
Page: << Prev | 1 | 2 "A lot of these effects may be species-specific," said Jerry Siegel, a professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angeles. "In the rat, there is data indicating all sorts of dire effects from sleep deprivation leading to death. These are not seen in humans. So, generalizing to humans is not easy to do," he said. "There might be a connection, but you can't be sure."
Another expert isn't sure that the study proves that all sleep deprivation is necessarily stressful.
"There is no doubt that the protocol used here was stressful," said Joseph D. Miller, an associate professor of cell and neurobiology at the University of Southern California. "However, this is not so clear with other methods of sleep deprivation," Miller said.
Text Continues Below
"For instance, continuous, gentle handling of mice for six hours or so has been reported to cause near maximal increase in sleep propensity once the handling is terminated," he said. "But is this stressful? In an animal habituated to handling, this may be the least stressful way to sleep-deprive."
This could have a parallel in humans -- for example, the difference between partying for two or three nights straight (less stressful) or being forced by someone else to stay awake (very stressful).
"Conceivably, you might see an even larger number of surviving neurons if sleep deprivation is as non-stressful as possible," Miller explained. "It might be that sleep deprivation is not all that bad in humans if the associated stress can be reduced."
More information
There's more on healthy sleep at the U.S. National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (www.nhlbi.nih.gov ).
Page: << Prev | 1 | 2
|
.gif)
