Have a Good Night
How many hours of sleep did you get last night? Approximately 40 percent of Americans get less than the suggested eight hours of sleep each night.
"We are a chronically sleep-deprived culture," says Andrew Heyman, M.D., M.H.S.A., a fellow in Integrative Medicine in the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Michigan Health System.
Twenty to thirty percent of all primary care patients tell their physicians that they feel fatigued. Heyman says, "It is important to understand the distinction between tiredness and clinical fatigue. Once it begins to interfere with a person's life it moves from a general annoyance to a clinical problem."
A sense of tiredness can often be corrected by some lifestyle modifications like proper diet, adequate sleep and reducing stress. Heyman says that persistent fatigue, however, should not be ignored.
Heyman and his colleagues in Integrative Medicine rely on a comprehensive evaluation to diagnose what may be causing each patient's fatigue. Fatigue rarely results from a single cause. Possible contributing factors are sleep problems such as obstructive sleep apnea and insomnia, irregular adrenal function, the health of a person's digestive tract, and stress.
University of Michigan's Integrative Medicine Clinic (UMIMC) offers comprehensive treatments. Integrative Medicine's approach is healing-oriented, takes into account the whole person, and makes use of all appropriate therapies, both conventional and alternative. Heyman's patients have experienced very positive results. Improving someone's ability to sleep means restoring her daytime energy and her ability to function.
Call 734-615-1900 to make an appointment. Find out more here.
Reading List
The Harvard Medical School Guide to a Good Night's Sleep (Harvard Medical School Guides) by Lawrence Epstein and Steven Mardon
Getting a Good Night's Sleep (A Cleveland Clinic Guide) by Nancy Foldvary-Schaefer
Good Night: The Sleep Doctor's 4-Week Program to Better Sleep and Better Health by Dr. Michael Breus
This article appeared in the June/July 08 issue of the Women's Health Newsletter. Read the issue.
