We finished the last blog in mid-thought. We were talking about REM sleep and the idea of brain plasticity- the rewiring of our brains that take place when we learn new information. A recent study in rats showed that 4 days of REM sleep deprivation decreased the amount of new cells in the part of the brain that is associated with long-term memory, in other words they did not make those new circuits. Another study with... More at...
Former Senator Tom Daschle has vowed that if chosen to be health secretary, the healthcare reform process will be aggressive and open, and it will move quickly to improve care while lowering costs. More at...
In my last blog we began a discussion of seasonal affective disorder or SAD. We will pick up where we left off. There is actually some debate in the psychiatric community whether or not SAD is actually a separate diagnosis, apart from general depression. Those who claim it is not suggest that it is no more than a seasonal coincidence that occurs in someone with recurring episodes of depression. As support to this idea... More at...
Let’s continue on our topic of naps in healthy adults- the good, the bad, and the otherwise. Some more good news about napping. As we all have probably experienced in our life, a short nap has helped us learn something that we simply couldn’t grasp beforehand. This is because after intense work, parts of our brain begin to show signs of information saturation, meaning our brains are at capacity and we... More at...
Obese children who have difficulty breathing while they sleep have excessive daytime sleepiness compared with slimmer children who are also chronic snorers, new research in the journal Pediatrics shows. More at...
A reporter picks the top six health stories of 2008, including stem cell research, autism, and health care reform. More at...
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
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