Sleep deprivation is more than an inconvenience — it’s a serious health risk. Our attitudes towards sleep need a revolution.
Sleep is deeply misunderstood. Many people mistakenly believe foregoing sleep in order to gain extra working hours carries minor risks — when in fact getting less than six hours of sleep at night strongly correlates with a higher risk of several chronic conditions, including high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke, and dementia. And pushing yourself to stay awake in order to boost productivity — a misguided badge of honor among driven professionals — has diminishing returns, as studies have shown that long periods without sleep result in cognitive impairment equivalent to having several alcoholic drinks.
The true impact of sleep deprivation comes into focus when you consider that 50 to 70 million Americans suffer from one of the 90 recognized chronic sleep disorders. The conclusion is obvious: Sleep is foundational to our health, and insufficient sleep negatively impacts not just employees’ health, but also their productivity and overall wellness.
Lack of education
A major obstacle in the pursuit of better sleep is a lack of focus on the topic in top medical schools. According to a survey conducted by Dr. Daniel Goh at the National University Children’s Medical Institute in Singapore, medical schools provide an average of less than three hours of instruction in sleep science — total.
That presents a challenge in dealing with sleep disorders. Treatments like digital cognitive behavioral therapy (eCBTi) have been shown to be highly effective for many common sleep disorders, for example, but it is often difficult for people to even learn about eCBTi, much less engage with it.
As a result, many turn to pharmaceutical sleep aids — which can induce undesirable side effects and often come with a risk of addiction — or simply learn to live with fatigue all the time and the impact that has on their lives. This in turn has an enormous cost in terms of healthcare: Chronic diseases cost the U.S. healthcare system trillions of dollars each year, and many of these conditions correlate strongly with sleep deprivation.
Digital sleep solutions
Fortunately, increased awareness of the importance of treating sleep disorders combined with innovative digital technologies has led to robust new sleep solutions. People leverage a range of solutions from digital therapeutics and connected devices to telehealth platforms and virtual medicine to help them understand and treat their sleep disorders.
One of the most comprehensive sleep solutions is SleepCharge® from Nox Health (whose motto is “All we do is sleep®”). It brings end-to-end program management to the diagnosis, treatment, and ever-present aftercare together via a robust telehealth platform that connects individuals with a team of board certified sleep specialists.
SleepCharge® offers programs for a broad range of sleep disorders — apnea, insomnia, circadian rhythm disorders and more, based on a next-generation model of eCBTi, as well as cutting-edge treatments for disordered breathing, which have been shown to reduce the number of times people suffering from sleep apnea stop breathing per hour.
When offered as a benefit, SleepCharge® provides workers a single point of contact and a personalized approach to learning more about the importance of sleep, identifying the underlying causes of their sleep challenges, and implementing treatments and assessments on their own schedule.
Better sleep has a profound effect on the body and mind. Deep, restful nighttime sleep is a time of active renewal, critical to ensuring the body and brain are able to reset, renew, and power back up in the morning. Solutions like SleepCharge® by Nox Health represent a new wave in sleep health that will change the way people sleep for the better.
SleepCharge® by Nox Health is bringing the sleep revolution to wherever people are in their health journeys — powered by science, enabled by tech, and supported by a world class team of sleep physicians and sleep coaches. So everyone can wake up to a brighter day. Every day.
