Sleep disorders: Healthy sleep is vital!

In our modern meritocracy, qualities such as “mobility” and “flexibility” are increasingly required. Regardless of our natural need for sleep and rest, we are adapting our way of life more and more to technology. Production and service processes must be maintained around the clock to utilize expensive machines and make everyday items available anytime and anywhere.

Man gets tired, machine doesn’t

Despite all the mechanization, people usually play an important, controlling role. “The fact that machines work non-stop, while humans are subject to biological limits, is often disregarded: they get tired, the machine doesn’t,” says Prof. Dr. Jürgen Zulley, Head of the Sleep Medicine Center at the University of Regensburg.

“Microsleep” – high number of unreported cases

The consequences are often severe if the natural need for sleep and rest is ignored. Mainly when overtired people operate machines or drive motor vehicles. Almost every driver is familiar with the problem of “microsleep”. Nevertheless, this phenomenon is complex to record in statistics because “who likes to admit that they caused an accident because they fell asleep at the wheel.”, says Johannes Th. Hübner, Automobilclub von Deutschland eV (AvD), “The common explanation is then often human error.”

Experts estimate that fatigue accounts for 15-20% of all transportation accidents. This makes it the most common verifiable cause of accidents and exceeds the number of accidents caused by alcohol and drugs. The economic damage caused by fatigue-related accidents is high; in Germany, it is estimated at 10 billion euros annually.

Healthy sleep is vital.

However, the consequences of irregular sleeping times, shortened sleep duration and non-restorative sleep are not only reflected in the accident and damage statistics. Good sleep is a central and highly underestimated basic human need and essential for maintaining full performance, concentration and responsiveness. Due to the mobile 24-hour society, our natural sleeping behaviour is severely disturbed. Those who sleep badly not only reduce their well-being and quality of life during the day.

Chronic sleep disorders can have fatal long-term consequences and lead to high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, stroke, gastrointestinal diseases, cancer and psychiatric disorders such as depression. A vital sleep disorder in this context is sleep apnea  (stopping breathing during sleep).

Sleep disorders need better care.

Recent studies assume that in Germany alone, 10% of the population suffers from sleep disorders that require treatment. Nevertheless, sleep disorders are generally considered trivial and are often not mentioned when visiting the doctor. Only a third of those who suffer from a disorder that requires treatment (6% of the population) speak to a doctor about it. Nevertheless, the expenditure on statutory health insurance for these funds is considerable.

The problem is that sleeping pills are often taken uncritically over a long period, while the actual cause is not sufficiently investigated. A fundamentally new approach to sleep and performance focuses on the actual criteria for restful sleep. “Sleep quality and time of sleep characterize restful sleep. Less sleep duration is often in the foreground in public.”, says Prof. Dr. Zulley.