Sleep disorders and how they affect an individual's mental and physical health

The topic I chose to cover on my research paper is Insomnia and sleeping disorders. Insomnia is a particular sleeping disorder that is characterized by difficulty falling and/or staying asleep. I chose this topic because it stood out to me because I have always heard about insomnia, and many people saying how potentially dangerous it could be, and I want to find out all the important facts and information of insomnia. I am also hoping to learn the disadvantages to having insomnia and how it can affect people every day. Also, how it can affect people on how they live during the day because insomnia is having trouble to fall and stay asleep. I will be talking about what insomnia is and other sleeping disorders. Also, I will be discussing other types of sleeping disorders and how they can also affect humans in everyday environments.

In the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders which is also known as the DSM-5, it contained information on all sleeping disorders and not just the insomnia in general. The DSM-5 contained information on what was entitled Sleep-Wake Disorders. According to the DSM-5 (2013), “ sleep-wake disorders encompass 10 conditions manifested by disturbed sleep and cause distress as well as impairment in daytime functioning…including both individual disorders and several disorder groups, which are approached categorically and dimensionally” (p. 1). Most of the disorders that are listed that deal with sleep-wake contain them with the consequences and changes. The consequences of Disturbed Sleep concern what most people expect and are: fatigue and cognitive focus, also a major factor that can be affected is mood. You can be very tired and if you are not in a great mood it will affect you and you will not be able to sleep which will cause sleeping disorders.

Stated in the DSM, “ A sleep disorder only is a risk factor for subsequent development of certain mental conditions, but a potential warning sign for serious mental or medical issues” (p. 1). This is a bad issue to be diagnosed with a sleeping disorder because if you are it may cause medical problems, such as congestive heart failure, osteoarthritis, and Parkinson’s disease. The DSM-5 differs to the DSM-4 as according to the DSM-5 it states that conditions that were separated from the DSM-4 were put together in the DSM-5 to help the diagnosis to be an easier process. The DSM-5 is improved because it has much more information on the diagnosis and criteria rather than the DSM-4.

Sleeping Disorders are changes in sleeping patterns or habits that can negatively affect someone’s health. The most common sleeping disorders that are found and diagnosed in humans consist of sleep walking, narcolepsy, and insomnia. According to Smith (2016), “ Sleeping disorders are caused by stress, health conditions, medications, and can also be cause by the amount of coffee you drink” (Smith, Robinson, Segal, 2016). The causes to sleeping disorder can really affect a person long term if they are not diagnosed with any type of disorder or they do not do anything to solve their problem they have with the sleeping disorders. Sleep walking is a common sleeping disorder that can affect you deeply or not as much as others. Sleep walking is getting up and walking around while you are sleeping or half asleep. It is mostly common in children, and is usually not a problem anymore when the children become teens, the Mayo Clinic Staff found that “ it is very common and there are more than 3 million cases each year in the US” (Staff, 2014) what can doctors and psychiatrists do to help decrease these significant numbers? They would have to look at the causes of sleep walking which are: being sleep deprived, being tired, being stressed and depressed and taking medication. According to the Staff (2014), “ it is important to protect anyone in your household from seriously getting injured” (Staff, 2014). Treatments for sleep walking are not necessary for those in children, but they do include changes in medications if the diagnosis believes the medication is casing the sleep walking, and waking up the patient 15 minutes before they go to bed, and wake them up 5 minutes after they fall asleep.

One other big sleeping disorder is narcolepsy, however according to Swierzewski III (2000), this disorder is not that common than others as “ it affects every 25 people in 100, 000 in the United States…Narcolepsy is characterized by intermittent, uncontrollable episodes of falling asleep during the daytime. (Swierzewski, III, 2000) The symptoms of narcolepsy include, muscle weakness, hallucinating while trying to fall asleep, and having sleep paralysis. Also according to Swierzewski III (2000), “ about 125, 000 people in the United States alone suffer from this disorder, with an equal incidence among both women and men”

Insomnia is the greatest sleeping disorder and most well-known throughout the country. Insomnia is having trouble to falling asleep poorly due to waking up too early, having trouble falling asleep throughout the night, and having an episode where you are not able to remember sleep once a month. I learned that there are three stages of insomnia, Initial Insomnia, Middle Insomnia, and Terminal Insomnia. In psychology today, “ Individuals vary normally in their need for, and their satisfaction with, sleep. Insomnia may cause problems during the day, such as tiredness, difficulty concentrating and irritability” (Psychology Today). This shows that a big factor into getting insomnia is when you do not have any sleep during night and you are constantly tired during the day. According to the National Sleep Foundation, (National Sleep Foundation, 2016) “ it is more common for men and women age 65+ to stay asleep throughout the night”, and it is also more common for the elderly to have insomnia because of their medical history and most have to take medication. Medication can sometimes keep you awake and give you trouble with falling asleep. Some other major factors that can cause insomnia according to the National Sleep Foundation, “ being depressed and having anxiety” (National Sleep Foundation, 2016) With anxiety it can be, feeling overwhelmed with having too much to do, thinking about events that happened in the past or worrying what will happen in the future, and also having tension. (National Sleep Foundation, 2016) There are only two types of treatment for insomnia, Non- medical treatments, and medical. I believe non-medical is best because you can use techniques such as relaxation training, stimulus control, and cognitive behavior therapy. These techniques deal with the brain and doing exercises that will help and solve your problems with insomnia.

Insomnia is affective to many people today in the United States which about 3 million cases are reported every year. There is no cure, but treatment can gradually help. My result of my research was that all sleeping disorders can lead to so much stress and cause greater problems in everyday lives, from just not being able to sleep. This will help me because if I ever have trouble sleeping for a period of time I would go to a doctor or psychiatrist , and ask what I can do to help decrease the problem. I enjoyed the research for this project, but I did not enjoy the topic itself. With that, I do wish I had picked a different topic, because the sleeping disorders did not appeal to me as much as I thought it would.