
Didn't Get Enough Sleep? You Might As Well Be Drunk - bparsons
http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/09/04/didnt-get-enough-sleep-you-might-as-well-be-drunk/
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tghw
Out of curiosity, I went looking for medical error rates from before the max
shift lengths were decreased a few years ago and, compared to now. The study I
found on it concluded that error rates did not meaningfully change, even
though the residents were theoretically better rested.

Upon further examination, they found that error rates due to fatigue had
decreased, but that error rates related to patient handoffs had increased by a
similar amount. The long shifts, while being a source of fatigue, did provide
for good continuity of care, as the same doctor handled the case for longer.

Once the study team started addressing some of the problems in handoffs, such
as going through the patients alphabetically instead of by severity, they
began to see the error rates decrease.

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ComputerGuru
(This is mainly unrelated but simply fascinating)

I came across an article on this same topic, regarding a man who after being
shot in the head could no longer sleep..... and apparently lived (as a fully
functioning human being??) for 40 more years:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kern](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kern)

The problem is that I cannot find any scholarly articles that mention him
(searched on Google Scholar, do not have access to other journals) and the
wikipedia article has an extreme dearth of scientific details/sources on this
individual; the citations listed are mainly mass media stories.

As someone who has (mainly unsuccessfully) waged a battle against sleep almost
my entire life, this story that I came across yesterday intrigued me greatly,
and the lack of medical details frustrated me to no end.

~~~
Swizec
For a definitive weapon against sleep you could look into modafinil. I haven't
tried it because all the shady websites where you can buy it only ship to the
US, but apparently it turns off your need for sleep completely with next to no
effects of sleep deprivation.

But I wouldn't use it to skip more than a night of sleep. Sounds like a bad
idea because you do need to sleep. Sleep is good for you.

~~~
timw6n
Be very careful with modafinil: the side effects can be very severe

"later in the evening she fainted from exhaustion and woke up blind. It took
the longest two minutes of all our lives for her eyesight to return fully, and
she developed shakes like I’ve never seen, which we couldn’t stop"

“I was mid-conversation and my nose started to bleed uncontrollably, blood was
gushing. I completely freaked out”

“Physically, he looked rough, says Charles. He was completely exhausted, his
cheeks were pasty and grey, and his body was exhibiting clear signs of sleep
deprivation.”

“One friend tried the drug just once, and was plagued by serious, mind numbing
headaches. Another couldn’t sleep for two days, despite spending 8 hours in
bed per night trying."

Source: [http://www.nouse.co.uk/2009/06/30/modafinil-the-new-
wonder-d...](http://www.nouse.co.uk/2009/06/30/modafinil-the-new-wonder-drug/)

~~~
computer
Those experiences seem strangely spectacular, they are very different from any
experiences I've witnessed or read about. Also, they decided to just use it to
skip every nights' sleep? That's not what modafinil is meant for, nor is it
capable of replacing sleep in that way.

More people doing dumb shit without having a clue, I guess...

    
    
      "With a Friday psychology exam looming, she stayed awake nearly sixty hours,
      sleeping for just four. "

seriously...

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dimitar
Good:

* The idea is pretty interesting; I feel like I'm drunk, but I'm undersleeping the last few months.

* The major reason I don't get enough sleep is that I need to binge from time to time to get things done or enjoy life. I think I'll do better if I could track my sleeping needs before I get to feel like I do now

Bad:

* TA looks like an advertisement

* The website uses words like "your workforce". I hope employers stay away from their employees sleep. What's next? Stool samples. Management in many places already likes to treat employees like lab rats or machines to be repaired.

~~~
plorkyeran
> I hope employers stay away from their employees sleep.

In theory it could turn out well, if it turned out that the numbers said it
was better to pay people to take an hour nap in the middle of the work day.

In practice I assume it'd turn out to be more of a mandatory unpaid nap, of
course.

~~~
aliciahatt
Thank you for your input. Upside of employees knowing how the staff sleep
overall (nothing to a specific employee) could possibly lead to a better shift
schedule and the ability to feel less fatigued in your free time

~~~
ketralnis
Or it could lead to employers demanding that employees give them all of their
alert time rather than more normal hours.

"Could possibly lead" isn't really a good reason to start giving up privacy

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sejje
I'm a bit surprised that .08 BAC corresponds to 70% ability.

That means that in many cases, a good-but-legally-drunk driver will be vastly
out-performing a terrible-but-sober driver.

I'm just glad my car will drive itself soon.

~~~
enraged_camel
>>That means that in many cases, a good-but-legally-drunk driver will be
vastly out-performing a terrible-but-sober driver.

Not really. Drunk-driving is illegal due to increased reaction times, not
decreased driving ability. You can be drunk and properly follow the traffic
laws, but if you run into a situation that requires quick reflexes you're much
more likely to not react quickly enough.

Whereas terrible drivers are generally terrible in other ways.

~~~
iopq
Someone who has a low reaction time overall might have a better reaction time
drunk than someone with a reaction time of a dead cow. My friend claims 0.1
reaction time on a game where you have to click your mouse (I believe him
because he's a professional gamer so it makes sense), while I score 0.2 at
best (which is average) and older people score worse and worse

~~~
Wingman4l7
Hence why some people are fighting the politically unpopular fight to get
older people off the road. No one wants to be seen as the one that "stole
grandma's freedom".

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zerooneinfinity
You know I use to see these articles and think, 'that's not me, I can function
just fine with 5-6 hrs and a nap, and it was true, I could function just fine.

What I didn't realize is the long term effects it would have on me, my memory
became really bad, I was irritable to the point where I thought that's just
who I was and worst of all I started having a really hard time grasping new
concepts.

I've been getting 7-10 hrs of sleep a night for about two months now and I
already noticed a drastic difference in my brains performance.

PSA: Those extra couple of hours of staying awake aren't worth it guys!

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educating
Someone with sleep apnea here. I think it is great when the problem of lack of
sleep gets more attention. Though my snoring and pain at night has caused my
sleep apnea, the lack of sleep is what has caused all of my health and mental
problems. I've tried CPAP, dental appliance, and every other type of device
you can think of. Ended up with a dental appliance but I still get very little
REM and not enough sleep in-general. I haven't woken well-rested in maybe 25
years. It is horrible. Depression, weight problems, CRS (can't remember shit),
people think I'm an idiot, often irritated, hopeless, tired all the time.
Basically, it really, really sucks.

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bdclimber14
I'm curious of the different impact between normal sleep deprivation and
primary insomnia. It's common that insomniacs don't feel sleepy during the day
as compared to a normal sleeper that simply didn't get enough.

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codezero
The device apparently uses actigraphy, which is super common. It is just
measuring movement when sleeping, same as WakeMate (RIP) and Jawbone UP.
Besides that I don't see what they are doing that is special except targeting
specific sectors that optimize for job safety.

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Swizec
Can't remember exact resource right now, but I've been researching sleep
deprivation and related topics for a chapter in my book and apparently every
hour of sleep deprivation reduces your cognitive performance by roughly 25%.

I found that rather fascinating.

~~~
tannerc
This is interesting, especially for someone who has researched the concept
before.

Some immediate questions come to mind, like: at what point do you start
tracking hours as sleep deprived versus not? What areas of cognitive
performance are being evaluated exactly? How was the research collected and
what was the sample size?

Any time I see explicit numbers like this connected to neuroscience a bunch of
little red flags start to fly up. But then again, I didn't sleep well last
night.

~~~
Swizec
If memory serves, they measured reaction time, short-term memory and ability
to solve complex tasks. Can't remember how they measured what is a sleep
deprived hour and what isn't.

Also "ability to solve complex tasks" seems like it might be difficult to
quantify and I can't remember how they did that.

But it's fairly easy to measure the difference in reaction times and capacity
to remember strings of numbers.

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dpmehta02
Here's some more short and sweet sleep info, straight from the man who founded
the world's first sleep research laboratory:
[http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/sleepless.html](http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/sleepless.html)

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junto
Try having kids. I've been sleep deprived for several years and my health has
noticeably suffered.

I've also noticed that when I'm tired I tend to get stressed much faster.

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davidw
As a very jet lagged individual, I have to concur.

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chrisvineup
You ARE PRESUMHNING I'M NOT TDRUNK!

~~~
chrisvineup
AGAIN!! Always JUGINDG ME!

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contextual
There's been a lot of scientific research and animal experimentation on sleep
the past several decades. Michel Jouvet[1] forced cats to stay awake until
they drowned. Most cats survived for 35 days.[2]

Tony Schwartz in his book "The Way We're Working Isn't Working" also mentioned
a study on laboratory mice. They were deprived of ever sleeping until they
died.

From this Tony Schwatz advises we have a daily nap.

I'm sure there are countless other hellish and inhumane experiments animals
are going through to better our understanding of sleep. But it seems like we
still don't know much.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Jouvet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Jouvet)
[2] [http://psychology4a.com/sleep8.htm](http://psychology4a.com/sleep8.htm)

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cmccabe
That's always been my philosophy too.

