A new literature review describes a consistent characterization of fragmented nighttime sleep in patients with narcolepsy. 

A study in the September issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine suggests that the Nonrestorative Sleep Scale (NSS) is a valid and reliable tool for the assessment of nonrestorative sleep, the subjective feeling that sleep has been insufficiently refreshing.

On Tuesday, Sept. 3, an article and infographic in the print edition of The Wall Street Journal provided a field guide to the perfect nap.  Multiple AASM members, including board of directors member Ilene Rosen, MD, explained the complex factors involved in the timing, duration and effects of daytime naps.

The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute announced this week that the next meeting of the Sleep Disorders Research Advisory Board will be Monday, Sept. 23, from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md.  

A study published in the Sept. 1 issue of Sleep suggests that people with insomnia could not modulate activity in brain regions typically used to perform a working memory task. 

A study in the July 15 issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine reports that a high percentage of patients with insomnia use sleep medications off-label in the middle of the night to resume sleep. 

In the July 3 issue of the journal Cell, some of the leading voices in the scientific community contributed brief commentaries on the subject, “Sequester impact on biomedical research.”  In “Science under siege,” National Institutes of Health Director Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD, warns that an entire generation of biomedical innovation is threatened by the federal government’s automatic budget cuts, known as the sequester.  He also notes that the U.S. is cutting research funding at a time when other nations – such as China and India – are increasing their financial commitment to research.  “Scientists must sound the alarm,” he writes.

In April the Food and Drug Administration announced that narcolepsy was selected as one of the disease areas to be addressed during the first three years of its Patient-Focused Drug Development initiative. Last week the FDA announced that it will hold a public meeting to gather patient and patient stakeholder input on how narcolepsy impacts daily life and on current approaches to treating narcolepsy. 

The National Sleep Foundation is seeking applications for research grants of $10,000 or less for small-scale research projects at a sharply-focused level on one or more of these topics: caffeine and sleep, evaluation of sleep hygiene recommendations, sleep disturbance associated with communication technology, and sleeping surfaces/environments.

Combat-related trauma and pre-deployment insomnia symptoms are significantly associated with higher odds of developing post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety, according to a study in the July issue of SLEEP.