What happens when your brain doesn't sleep?

Disrupted sleep and circadian rhythm can have major impact on emotion, cognition and physical health. 

Source: https://agenda.weforum.org/2015/11/how-sleep-and-mental-health-are-linked-in-the-brain/

Improving sleep and cognition by clinical hypnotherapy in the elderly

Sleep quality markedly declines across the human lifespan. Particularly the amount of slow-wave sleep (SWS) decreases with age and this decrease is paralleled by a loss of cognitive functioning in the elderly. Here we show in healthy elderly females that the amount of SWS can be extended by a hypnotic suggestion "to sleep deeper" before sleep. In a placebo-controlled cross-over design, participants listened to hypnotic suggestions or a control tape before a midday nap while high density electroencephalography was recorded. After the hypnotic suggestion, we observed a 57% increase in SWS in females suggestible to hypnosis as compared to the control condition. 

Furthermore, left frontal slow-wave activity (SWA), characteristic for SWS, was significantly increased, followed by a significant improvement in prefrontal cognitive functioning after sleep. 

Our results suggest that hypnotic suggestions might be a successful alternative for widely-used sleep-enhancing medication to extend SWS and improve cognition in the elderly.


Source:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/25660206/

During sleep, the brain cleans itself

Every night since humans first evolved, we have made what might be considered a baffling, dangerous mistake. Despite the once-prevalent threat of being eaten by predators, and the loss of valuable time for gathering food, accumulating wealth, or having sex, we go to sleep. Scientists have long speculated and argued about why we devote roughly a third of our lives to sleep, but with little concrete data to support any particular theory. Now, new evidence has refreshed a long-held hypothesis: During sleep, the brain cleans itself.

Many neurological diseases—from Alzheimer's disease to stroke and dementia—are associated with sleep disturbances, Nedergaard notes. The study suggests that lack of sleep could have a causal role, by allowing the byproducts to build up and cause brain damage. "This could open a lot of debate for shift workers, who work during the nighttime,” Nedergaard predicts. "You probably develop damage if you don’t get your sleep."

Source: http://news.sciencemag.org/brain-behavior/2013/10/sleep-ultimate-brainwasher

10 medical reasons for feeling tired

Any serious illness, especially painful ones, can make you tired. But some quite minor illnesses can also leave you feeling washed out. Here are 10 health conditions that are known to cause fatigue.

1. Coeliac disease

This is a type of food intolerance, where your body reacts badly when you eat gluten – a substance found in bread, cakes and cereals. One in 100 people in the UK are affected, but research suggests that up to 90% of them don’t know they have the condition, according to patient group Coeliac UK. Other symptoms of coeliac disease, apart from tiredness, are diarrhoea, anaemia and weight loss. Your GP can check if you have coeliac disease through a blood test.

2. Anaemia

One of the most common medical reasons for feeling constantly run down is iron deficiency anaemia. It affects around one in 20 men and post-menopausal women, but may be even more common in women who are still having periods.

Typically, you’ll feel you can’t be bothered to do anything, your muscles will feel heavy and you’ll get tired very quickly. Women with heavy periods and pregnant women are especially prone to anaemia.

3. Chronic fatigue syndrome

Chronic fatigue syndrome (also called myalgic encephalomyelitis or ME) is a severe and disabling tiredness that goes on for at least six months. There are usually other symptoms, such as a sore throat, muscle or joint pain and headache.

4. Sleep apnea

Sleep apnea is a condition where your throat narrows or closes during sleep and repeatedly interrupts your breathing. This results in bad snoring and a drop in your blood's oxygen levels. The difficulty in breathing means that you wake up often in the night, and feel exhausted the next day.

It’s most common in overweight, middle-aged men. Drinking alcohol and smoking makes it worse.

5. Underactive thyroid

An underactive thyroid gland means that you have too little thyroid hormone (thyroxine) in your body. This makes you feel tired. You’re also likely to put on weight and have aching muscles. It’s most common in women, and it happens more often as you get older.

Your GP can diagnose an underactive thyroid by taking a blood test.

6. Diabetes

One of the main symptoms of diabetes, a long-term condition caused by too much sugar in the blood, is feeling very tired. The other key symptoms are feeling very thirsty, going to the toilet a lot and weight loss. Your GP can diagnose diabetes with a blood test.

7. Glandular fever

Glandular fever is a common viral infection that causes fatigue, along with fever, sore throat and swollen glands. Most cases happen in teenagers and young adults. Symptoms usually clear up within four to six weeks, but the fatigue can linger for several more months.

8. Depression

As well as making you feel very sad, depression can also make you feel drained of energy. It can stop you falling asleep or cause you to wake up early in the morning, which makes you feel more tired during the day.

9. Restless legs

This is when you get uncomfortable sensations in your legs, which keep you awake at night. You might have an overwhelming urge to keep moving your legs, a deep ache in your legs, or your legs might jerk spontaneously through the night. Whatever your symptoms, your sleep will be disrupted and of poor quality, so you’ll feel very tired throughout the day.

10. Anxiety

Feeling anxious is sometimes perfectly normal. However, some people have constant, uncontrollable feelings of anxiety, which are so strong they affect their daily life. Doctors call this generalised anxiety disorder (GAD). It affects around around one in 20 people in the UK. As well as feeling worried and irritable, people with GAD often feel tired.

Source；

http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/tiredness-and-fatigue/Pages/medical-causes-of-tiredness.aspx

[Review] Insomnia - Pharmacist Miss T

For past few years, the lack of sleep was ruining my life!

Thus, I really hope that I can fall asleep easily by practicing personalized self hypnosis method. 

After finished 3 sessions of Neuro-hypnotherapy, I feel more stable and calm without medication involved. 

Now I am less worried about my sleep problem.

The environment is very comfortable and I feel happier after talking to Clinical Hypnotherapist Hiro Koo as he makes me feel more confident at work and daily life. 

The most significant change that I have noticed is I able to calm down myself, manage my mood state and reduce my stomach discomfort. Neuro-hypnotherapy does help me a lot. Overall I would say that everything is very good.

- Pharmacist Miss T

THERAPEUTIC OUTCOME

Miss T reports that she feels a sense of improvement after 25^th April 2015. She reports that she able to relax by practicing the personalized self-hypnosis and emotional freedom technique. Now she feels no more fear of losing control or worry about worst things will be happened on her. Also, she feels her stomach discomfort problem becomes less noticeable and it didn’t bother her much. The terrified, afraid and nervous feelings have also significantly reduced after first and second therapy sessions.

At work, she feels no more irritable and less restless than usual. Her energy level has increased and she found that her appetite is somewhat greater than usual. Now She feels that her concentration ability has improved.

Regarding her quality and patterns of sleep, she is usually gone to bed at 10pm. Although she still sleep around 6 hours every day, but she reports that her quality of sleep has improved. She able to fall asleep easier than usual. 

Remark: Our client's information will be kept strictly confidential all the time. All reviews have been acknowledged and provided by past and current clients of Spectrum of Life proactive healthcare centre (Clinical Hypnotherapist Hiro Koo) and all pictures displayed is for illustration purpose only. Clients names have been changed to protect their identity. 

[Review] Slow Learner Intervention & Training Program in Malaysia - Lai Case

Lai is having slow learner issue. For years she could not find any help. 

During the Senior Wellness Exhibition at Viva Mall November, 2014, she visited Spectrum of Life booth and did a Brain Assessment. 20 sessions of Brain Trainer was advised for her. 

Within 10 sessions she could see great results. 
She is now more alert; concentration and focus were a lot better than before, memory improved, sleeping quality improved drastically, and anxiety level reduced comparatively. 

These observations were made physically by herself and her parents. The post brainwave assessment showed great results too.







Remark: Our client's information will be kept strictly confidential all the time. All reviews and photos have been acknowledged and provided by past and current clients of Spectrum of Life proactive healthcare centre (Clinical Hypnotherapist Hiro Koo). Clients names have been changed to protect their identity. 

[Exhibitor] National Cancer Survivors Day 2015

I am here and I care!

It is an honour to be invited to participate in National Cancer Survivors Day 2015 which organized by the National Cancer Society Malaysia. Managing mental health needs is a crucial part for cancer patients or survivors. My role today is to provide brain assessment, support and treatment advice if necessary. 

There is a healthtalk on how the clinical hypnotherapy able to help cancer patients and cancer survivors. In fact, clinical hypnotherapy has proven to be extremely valuable in the treatment of cancer. Hypnosis has been shown to be effective for decreasing chemotherapy-related nausea and vomiting in children with cancer. 

Indeed, hypnotherapy is an effective supplement therapy in the management of terminally ill cancer patients in a hospice setting. It is useful in addressing: 

(1) management of anxiety, depression, anger, and frustration; 

(2) management of pain, fatigue, and insomnia; 

(3) management of side-effects of chemotherapy and radiotherapy; 

(4) visualization to promote health improvement. 

By successfully addressing these areas, studies have shown that hypnotherapy improves the individual quality of life and life expectancy. Further, there is a quantifiable cost savings to the hospital in terms of reduced medication and need for medical care.

One of the most well-known techniques involves the use of “positive mental images” of a strong army of white blood cells killing cancer cells. One 10-year follow-up study involving 86 women with cancer showed that a year of weekly “supportive/ expressive” group therapy significantly increased survival duration and time from recurrence to death. Postoperative complications and hospitalizations for the hypnotic intervention group are significantly shorter than the norm.

You can read this review:

"Hypnosis for Cancer Care: Over 200 Years Young" - The goal of this review was to summarize the empirical literature on hypnosis as an integrative cancer prevention and control technique. We have reviewed where hypnosis has strong support for its efficacy (surgery and other invasive procedures), where it holds promise (weight loss, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, metastatic disease), and where more work is needed.

Neuro-hypnotherapy is first of its kind in Malaysia developed by myself by combining technology (EEG biofeedback) and art of science (Clinical Hypnotherapy) which is best of two worlds. 

Feel free to contact me for a free brain assessment session. 

For more information on volunteering opportunities, you can contact the NCSM.

Source:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3755455/

http://web.wellness-institute.org/blog/bid/399323/The-Use-of-Hypnosis-in-Treating-Cancer

睡眠障礙引頭痛 自律神經失調元凶

「一覺到天亮，一暝大一吋」，但是，如果有失眠入睡困難、半夜醒來不易再睡等情況，恐罹患睡眠障礙，根據台灣睡眠醫學會一項「國人睡眠大調查」結果發現，台灣15至59歲的人口中，平均每5人就有1人深受失眠之苦。尤其值得注意的是，睡眠障礙會會引發偏頭痛。要揪出睡眠障礙造成頭痛的元凶，醫師建議必需兼顧生理與心理健康，尤其是要調整自自律神經失調的困擾。

睡眠障礙元凶　自律神經失調惹禍

為什麼睡眠障礙會引起頭痛？精神科醫師楊聰財表示，其實睡眠障礙只是冰山一角，冰山下的狀況要特別關注，睡眠障礙要從生理因素與心理因素去解決。其中生理因素主要來自自律神經失調，一旦自律神經不穩定，交感神經與副交感神經不協調，交感神經會過盛，引起血壓升高、肌肉緊繃、呼吸心跳加快，在交互影響下，便容易引起頭痛。

至於心理因素引起睡眠障礙，則常見出現慢性焦慮、憂鬱，或慢性壓力感如怒氣。焦慮、憂鬱與怒氣此三種統稱為「情緒障礙」，容易造成頭痛不適。臨床發現，10個有睡眠障礙問題的民眾，約有7、8個與情緒障礙有關。

自律神經失調　女多於男

楊聰財醫師表示，門診曾經收治許多因為出現頭暈、頭重、頭痛的患者求診，主訴特別的是頭痛位置有移動情況，有時頭頂痛，有時單側痛，有時兩邊同時痛，甚至疼痛會往下發展，合併肌肉緊繃、眼睛乾澀、呼吸不順、腹痛等不適症狀，但是進行腦波、心電圖、X光等檢查，卻發現都正常，一時找不到病因，經過進一步診斷才發現是慢性自律神經失調。

自律神經失調該怎麼改善？建議要兼顧生理與心理，照顧身心四個大支柱：即「能睡、能笑、能動、能吃」：

【調整自律神經失調方法】：

1.「能睡」：是指每天最好晚上11點睡覺，早上6點起床，維持正常睡眠。

2.「能笑」：指常保笑容能使腦內啡分泌，有益健康避免頭痛。

3.「能動」：指每周維持333規律運動，每週運動至少3天、每次30分鐘、心跳達到130下。 

4.「能吃」：指睡覺前適度食用包括鮮奶、香蕉與深海魚油等食物，有助於自律神經安定。

此外，平時要養成「說唱做寫」紓壓好方法4要訣，例如每天做深呼吸吐氣、睡前寫快樂日記等。

【醫師小叮嚀】：

楊聰財醫師表示，自律神經失調調整好，睡眠障礙即可降低，但是如果出現睡眠障礙，例如一周中有3天以上睡眠時間不到6小時，或是有入睡困擾，且情況連續兩周以上，影響日常生活，就可能是與情緒障礙影響到睡眠有關，建議可至精神科就醫檢查。

若是明明睡眠超過9小時以上，卻怎麼睡都覺得睡不夠，上班仍容易打瞌睡、精神不濟，則可能與生理有關，例如有睡眠呼吸中止症、打鼾等呼吸道問題，建議到睡眠中心進行睡眠檢查。

资料来源：

https://tw.news.yahoo.com/睡眠障礙引頭痛　自律神經失調元凶

The Health Benefits of Dreams

Dreams, memories, and emotions

The dream -- likely a means of coping with a major life stress --helped Kern, explains researcher Rosalind Cartwright, PhD, professor emeritus of psychology at Rush University in Chicago. “It’s almost like having an internal therapist, because you associate [through dreams] to previous similar feelings, and you work through the emotion related to it so that it is reduced by morning.”

Although some researchers believe dreams are just a byproduct of sleep, others think dreams are important for memory consolidation or conflict resolution. Cartwright has found clues to suggest that dreams may help with mood regulation.

Dreams occur during both REM (rapid-eye-movement) and non-REM sleep, but sleep studies show that brain activity is heightened during REM periods. When sleep-study participants are wakened during the first non-REM period, those who recall their dreams tend to report thinking about a piece of emotional unfinished business. The dreamer may then restate or reshape the problem in a different form during the next REM cycle, and so on, through the night.

Dreaming may help depression

Sleep is without a doubt beneficial. According to the National Sleep Foundation, humans spend more than two hours dreaming each night (with the most vivid dreams occurring during REM sleep). Rats deprived of that precious REM sleep for four days produce fewer nerve cells in the hippocampus, the brain’s memory center.

Among humans, dreaming may also help alleviate depression. In sleep studies of recently divorced women with untreated clinical depression, Cartwright and colleagues found that patients who recalled dreams and incorporated the ex-spouse or relationship into their dreams scored better on tests of mood in the morning. And they were much more likely to recover from depression than others who either did not dream about the marriage or could not recall their dreams.

“It really shows that there was an ongoing working through the night in the dream material, and eventually that the depression lifted in those people,” Cartwright says.

Looking back now, Kern says she was highly stressed at the time and the dream helped her realize how much the boy had been controlling her life. “It didn’t solve the problem,” she says, “but it helped put it in perspective.”

All retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/features/the-health-benefits-of-dreams?page=2

[Insomnia Specialist Malaysia] Sleep loss tied to emotional reactions

A person's loss of sleep can be connected to their likelihood of reacting emotionally to a stressful situation.

That is one of the recent findings included in a new book, "Sleep and Affect: Assessment, Theory and Clinical Implications," co-edited by a University of Arkansas psychology professor and his former doctoral student. Affect is a term in psychology that describes a broad range of emotional experiences.

"In our study, we wanted to find out if there was a link between the loss of sleep and our emotional response," said Matthew T. Feldner, a professor of psychology in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences. "We saw that if a person lost a night of sleep they responded with more emotion to a laboratory 'stressor.' This finding extended previous work that had linked chronic sleep loss to anxiety and mood disorders."

Feldner co-edited Sleep and Affect with Kimberly A. Babson, a health science specialist at the National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Menlo Park, California. Babson earned her doctorate in clinical psychology at the University of Arkansas.

Sleep and Affect summarizes research on the interplay of sleep and various components of emotion and affect that are related to mood disorders, anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder and depression.

"One of the themes that emerged across these chapters is that certain components of emotion seem particularly linked to sleep," Feldner said. "What we call 'stressors' tend to be more emotionally arousing for people who haven't slept well, and emotional arousal also appears to interfere with sleep quality."

Babson conducted sleep-and-affect studies at the U of A under a National Institutes of Health research training fellowship. That research spurred her's and Feldner's interest in a book that synthesizes the latest research into the interrelationships between sleep and affect.

"We present this information in a way that will help clinicians both assess for sleep problems and problems related to anxiety or mood, when a patient is seeking treatment for one and maybe not the other," he said. "By improving sleep, we might improve our treatments for anxiety problems."

This book also includes the latest findings in neuroscience related to sleep loss. There appear to be effects of sleep loss on the functioning of the emotional regulation circuit of the brain, Feldner said.

"Some of the neurobiological structures that we think are involved in regulating emotional or affective experiences don't seem to function the same after we lose sleep as they do when we are fully rested," he said.

"Sleep and Affect" is published by Elsevier Publishing.

Source:

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-03-loss-tied-emotional-reactions.html

[Sleep Specialist Malaysia] Brain waves predict our risk for insomnia

There may not yet be a cure for insomnia, but Concordia University researchers are a step closer to predicting who is most likely to suffer from it—just in time for World Sleep Day on March 13.

In his study published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, Thien Thanh Dang-Vu, from Concordia's Center for Studies in Behavioral Neurobiology and PERFORM Center, explores the impact of stress on sleep. Although researchers already know that stressful events can trigger insomnia, the experiment reveals that some people are more vulnerable than others to developing the condition.

To determine the role of stress, the study examined the sleep cycles of 12 Concordia students as they went through the nerve-racking experience of finals. Measuring students' brain waves at the beginning of the school semester, Dang-Vu and his team found that students showing a lower amount of a particular pattern of brain waves were more at risk for developing insomnia afterwards in response to the stress of the exams.

The brain—specifically the deep, inner parts of the brain called the thalamus and cortex—produces electromagnetic activity during sleep. When monitored by diagnostic tools, this activity appears as patterns of squiggly lines that scientists refer to as spindles.

In a previous experiment, Dang-Vu and his team discovered that greater spindle activity helps sleepers resist waking, despite noise. The new study aimed to test whether there would be a similar relationship between spindles and stress.

The hypothesis proved true. "We found that those who had the lowest spindle activity tended to develop more disturbances in response to stress, when comparing sleep quality at the beginning of the semester and the end of the school semester," Dang-Vu says.

"We are not all equally armed when facing stress, in terms of how we can manage our sleep. Some people are more vulnerable than others."

How to increase spindle?

The preliminary studies carried out for the FWF project showed the positive effects of EEG biofeedback training on healthy people. This method has therefore now been tested in a pilot study on patients aged between 19 and 50 who suffer from sleep disorders. "The brain oscillations are trained during waking to a frequency range of between 12 and 15 hertz, known as the sensorimotor rhythm. This frequency range is also prominent in light sleep and manifests itself as sleep spindles, particularly when a person is falling asleep", explains Schabus. The patients were able to observe and learn to control their own sensorimotor rhythm (measured using EEG electrodes) on the computer screen. They were tasked with moving a compass needle on the screen to a green dot using only the power of mental relaxation. They received positive visual feedback each time they reached this dot, i.e. to increase the band power between 12 and 15 hertz.

"Using the training, we managed to strengthen the sensorimotor rhythm in a waking state and the sleep spindles in 16 out of 24 patients with mild insomnia. Those who responded well to the training reported an improvement in the quality of their sleep. This was ascertained by self-monitoring methods like sleep diaries and importantly also verified in our sleep laboratory", says Schabus, outlining the process. Each of the participants visited the sleep laboratory a total of 21 times, which meant that the effects could be studied in great detail. The researchers were also able to establish positive effects on memory consolidation when word pairs were retested after sleep following earlier learning. Interestingly, the subjective sleep quality among patients who successfully completed this type of biofeedback training also showed improvement

What is sleep spindle?

A sleep spindle is a burst of oscillatory brain activity visible on an EEG that occurs during stage 2 sleep. It consists of 12–14 Hz waves that occur for at least 0.5 seconds. Sleep spindles are generated in the reticular nucleus of the thalamus.

How newmindcentre.com can help you? 

1) Neuro-Hypnotherapy:

Doctors at Harvard University found that hypnotherapy actually promotes faster healing. Get hypnotized. Many insomniacs have tried this with great success. Under hypnosis, you might work out any personal issues that are robbing you of sleep. A clinical hypnotherapist can also "program" you to sleep. Our neuro-hypnotherapy technique able to help you! Personalized self-hypnosis method to fall asleep will be developed based on your brainwave response.

2) EEG biofeedback therapy/Neurotherapy 

Our EEG biofeedback/Neurotherapy is based on the international standardized 10-20 electrode location system. it is essentially a way of teaching you how to self-regulate your own electrical activity in the brain. A powerful tool for helping people fall asleep and stay asleep. Over 3,000 licensed health professionals such as psychologists, therapists, and doctors now use this new technology daily with patients. As a group, they report significant and consistent improvements for client sleep problems.

Call to schedule an appointment to meet me.

Based on your condition, I can help you to find the cause and suggest appropriate treatment.

Contact me now for more information.

Source:

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-04-brain-medication-counter-insomnia.html

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-03-brain-insomnia.html#nRlv

[Light Sleeper Treatment Malaysia] What makes someone a light sleeper?

What makes someone a light sleeper? 

For some people, the slightest noise awakens them at night. For others, the wailing siren of a passing fire truck doesn’t disturb their slumber. Just why, though, remains a bit of a mystery. Although many people are self-proclaimed light sleepers or heavy sleepers, researchers have found that little is actually known about why people react differently to noises and other stimuli during sleep. Genetics, lifestyle choices, and undiagnosed sleep disorders may all play a role. In addition, some studies suggest that differences in brainwave activity during sleep may also make someone a light or heavy sleeper.

Light and Deep Sleep During sleep, you alternate between cycles of REM (rapid eye movement) and NREM (non-rapid eye movement) that repeat about every 90 minutes. You spend about 75 percent of the night in NREM sleep, which consists of four stages of increasing relaxation. 

Stage one, or the phase between being awake and asleep, is considered light sleep. 

Deeper sleep begins in stage two, as your breathing and heart rate become regular and your body temperature drops. 

Stages three and four are the deepest and most restorative stages of sleep, in which breathing slows, muscles relax, and tissue growth and repair occurs. 

Someone who gets eight hours of sleep a night may not experience as much slow-wave, deep sleep as the person who get six hours of sleep.

What Contributes to Light Sleep?

A small study, published in 2010 in Current Biology, suggests that differences in how sleeping people respond to noise may be related to levels of brain activity called sleep spindles. The researchers found that people whose brains produced the most of these high-frequency sleep spindles were more likely to sleep through loud noises. But more research is needed to confirm the results. Dr. Neubauer said that if someone is complaining of not feeling rested because of being a light sleeper, they should look at the factors that might be contributing to the inability to achieve a deep sleep.

Now, for the first time, sleep researchers at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, led by neurologist Dr. Jeffrey Ellenbogen, have isolated the brain-wave pattern that predicts where an individual's brain has struck a balance between those demands — a window into how likely noises are to wake people from deep sleep.

For the three-night study, Ellenbogen's group invited 12 volunteers who reported being deep and healthy sleepers into a sleep lab with a comfy queen-size bed outfitted with enormous speakers at the headboard. The researchers recorded the participants' brain waves as they slept normally the first night, and then on subsequent nights as they were bombarded with 14 different noises — from the din of car traffic and the roar of airplane engines to flushing toilets and slamming doors — which were played at progressively louder volumes.

Ellenbogen paid particular attention to the patterns generated by the thalamus, a region deep in the brain that processes incoming visual and auditory stimuli. He found that the number of pulses, known as sleep spindles, generated by this organ and measured by an electroencephalogram (EEG), which records electrical activity in the brain, varied among the sleepers. Those with the highest number of spindles were able to sleep through more sounds without waking than those whose brains showed fewer spindles. "We wanted to know, if we counted the spindles the first night, did that predict anything about their subsequent sleep?" says Ellenbogen. "And indeed it did. More spindles meant they were more likely to be protected from sleep disruption."

How newmindcentre.com can help you? 

1) Neuro-Hypnotherapy:

Doctors at Harvard University found that hypnotherapy actually promotes faster healing. Get hypnotized. Many insomniacs have tried this with great success. Under hypnosis, you might work out any personal issues that are robbing you of sleep. A clinical hypnotherapist can also "program" you to sleep. Our neuro-hypnotherapy technique able to help you! Personalized self-hypnosis method to fall asleep will be developed based on your brainwave response.

2) EEG biofeedback therapy/Neurotherapy 

EEG biofeedback/Neurotherapy is based on the international standardized 10-20 electrode location system. it is essentially a way of teaching you how to self-regulate your own electrical activity in the brain. A powerful tool for helping people fall asleep and stay asleep. Over 3,000 licensed health professionals such as psychologists, therapists, and doctors now use this new technology daily with patients. As a group, they report significant and consistent improvements for client sleep problems.

Call to schedule an appointment to meet me.

Based on your condition, I can help you to find the cause and suggest appropriate treatment.

Contact me now for more information.

Source:

http://www.ehow.com/how_7828707_cure-light-sleeping.html

http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2009401,00.html

http://www.clearmindofcolorado.com/research-on-sleep-disorders/

Hypnotherapy May Help Improve Deep Sleep

In the US, over a quarter of the population report not getting enough sleep, and almost 10% endure chronic insomnia. But new research from two universities in Switzerland suggests hypnosis has a surprising positive impact on quality of sleep.

The researchers, led by biopsychologist Björn Rasch from the Psychological Institute of the University of Zurich, say their findings "open up new, promising opportunities for improving the quality of sleep without drugs."

They publish their research in the journal Sleep.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) note that although sleep is often considered a "passive" activity, ample sleep is an essential part of staying healthy and preventing disease.

Insufficient sleep is linked with several chronic diseases, such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity and depression.

Additionally, the researchers of this latest study say that slow-wave sleep (SWS) has a positive impact on memory and immune system function, and during this period of sleep, the body secretes growth hormones, promotes cell repair and improves brain plasticity. However, the team also notes that SWS declines significantly across a person's lifespan.

Hypnosis is a technique that can impact processes that are difficult to voluntarily control - for example, when you are exhausted and want to sleep but are unable to do so.

Although patients with sleep conditions have been successfully treated with hypnotherapy in the past, the researchers say that until now, objectively measurable changes in sleep have not been proven.

In order to further investigate, the team conducted a study with 70 healthy young women who came to the sleep laboratory for a 90-minute nap during midday.

During their nap, the researchers objectively measured their sleep by recording electrical brain activity with an electroencephalogram (EEG). The team says slow-wave sleep is characterized by an even and slow oscillation in electrical activity in the brain.

Results showed that the women in the highly suggestible group experienced over 80% more SWS after hypnosis session, and their time spent awake was reduced by one third, compared with highly suggestible women who listened to the neutral text.

After they conducted additional control experiments, the researchers concluded that the beneficial effects of hypnosis on SWS were attributed to the hypnotic suggestion to "sleep deeper," stating that these effects were not simply expectancy effects.

'Unlike drugs, hypnosis has no side effects'

The research was only conducted in women, and the investigators note that females tend to have higher values for hypnotic susceptibility, compared with males. However, the team believes they would encounter similar positive effects of hypnosis on sleep for men who are highly suggestible.

Maren Cordi, a psychologist involved with the study, says "the results may be of major importance for patients with sleep problems and for older adults. In contrast to many sleep-inducing drugs, hypnosis has no adverse side effects."

The researchers conclude their study by noting that essentially everyone who responds to hypnosis could achieve better sleep with hypnosis.

Source: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/277731.php