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Gaylord Sleep Medicine will hold a Sleep Health Fair on Thursday, June 24 at 5:30 PM at Zandri's Stillwood Inn on 1074 South Colony Road, Route 5 in Wallingford, Connecticut. The Gaylord Sleep Health Fair will benefit people interested in learning about Sleep Disorders and Treatment options and is co-sponsored by Philips Respironics and Gaylord Sleep Medicine.

Speakers will include Meir Kryger, MD, Director of Research and Education for Gaylord Sleep Medicine, Keith Dixon, MD, Medical Director for Gaylord Sleep Medicine and Kevin Rush, RRT, RPSGT and Sleep Consultant for Philips Respironics.

Respironics, PROVENT® Sleep Apnea Therapy, J & L Medical Services and All-Med Health Care, Inc. will also be available with the newest sleep apnea and respiratory equipment as well as alternatives to CPAP that are exclusive to Gaylord Sleep Medicine. Dr. Stephen Palluotto, DMD will also show the dental alternatives to CPAP.

"This is an opportunity to learn about sleep apnea and other disorders that may be robbing you or a loved one of sleep that is vital to overall good health," Medical Director Keith Dixon said. "Sleep disorders have been linked to diabetes, stroke and high blood pressure."

Refreshments and snacks will be served. Please RSVP by June 22, 2010 via email to cpolaske@gaylord.org or by calling 203-605-2855.

Gaylord Sleep Medicine, the largest single provider of comprehensive sleep medicine services in Connecticut, treats patients with a range of sleep disorders including sleep apnea, hypersomnia and insomnia. Gaylord Sleep Medicine, also known for its acclaimed research program, is managed by Sleep HealthCenters with sites in Bridgeport, Hartford, Glastonbury, Guilford, North Haven and Trumbull.

They're BAA-AACK! Thirty years after bed bugs were believed to be exterminated nationwide, the teeny, insidious bloodsuckers--which feast on sleeping humans--are making a comeback of epidemic proportions.

They're being spotted in hotels from coast to coast. And not just the expected "fleabag" motels, but posh resorts and upscale chains. In a recent study of 700 mid-priced hotels, 25% were found to host uninvited guests. That gives travelers a 1-in-4 chance of bunking down with some unexpected roomies.

If awakened with red, itchy welts and irritated skin, one has been punked, bed-bug style. Some people even experience allergic reactions.

So, what are thoroughly creeped-out travelers to do? They can arm themselves with Rest Easy, an all-natural spray that keeps bed bugs at bay. Made from time-honored essential oils (cinnamon, lemongrass, clove, and mint), it's people-safe, earth-friendly, and even smells of minty goodness.

Good to know: the presence of cimex lectularius, aka the common bed bug, has nothing to do with cleanliness and everything to do with a transient population. Formerly wiped out in the U.S. by the now-banned pesticide DDT, bed bugs continued to flourish in other parts of the world. As global travel increased, they've hitchhiked their way back in on airplanes, luggage, and yes, travelers.

Found wherever people come and go--like hotel rooms, airports, and dorms--the 1/4" inch long nocturnal pests hide in furniture seams, box springs, and even tiny floor cracks, patiently awaiting a host (they can live without eating for up to a year).

The solution: spray Rest Easy around a hotel room upon arrival. It will kill some of them outright, and keep the rest deep in their hidey-holes. Luggage must be sprayed, too, because that's their ticket out.

Speaking of luggage, Rest Easy comes in a 2-ounce spray bottle that's carry-on friendly and available at stores like Bed, Bath & Beyond. You can buy it online at www.resteasykillsbedbugs.com, where it's also sold in larger quantities for home use.

Bedbugs are everywhere, so Rest Easy is perfect for wherever people travel, even fancy Manhattan hotels. In 2006, New York City received more than 4,500 bed bug complaints. . .which, come to think of it, may be why it's called the city that never sleeps.

SOURCE www.resteasykillsbedbugs.com

ResMed Inc. (NYSE: RMD) announced today that they will be presenting at three upcoming investor conferences.

• Kieran Gallahue, President and CEO will be presenting at the Canaccord Adams Global Growth Conference at the Intercontinental Boston Hotel in Boston on August 12, 2009 at 9:00 a.m. US Eastern Time
• David Pendarvis, SVP, Organization Development and General Counsel will be presenting at the Morgan Stanley Global Healthcare Conference at the Grand Hyatt in NYC on September 15, 2009
• David Pendarvis will present at the UBS Global Life Sciences Conference also at the Grand Hyatt in NYC on September 22, 2009
  

Actual presentation times for the latter two conferences will be able to be found on our website in the "Investor" section under "Event Calendar" in the near future as they are confirmed.

The Company's presentations will be webcast. To access the live webcast or the archived webcast of the presentation, please log onto the Company's website at http://investor.resmed.com. Further information can be obtained by contacting Constance Bienfait at ResMed Inc., San Diego, at +1(858) 836-5971 or by visiting the Company's multilingual Web site at www.resmed.com.

ResMed is a leading developer, manufacturer, and distributor of medical equipment for treating, diagnosing, and managing sleep-disordered breathing and other respiratory disorders. We are dedicated to developing innovative products to improve the lives of those who suffer from these conditions and to increasing awareness among patients and healthcare professionals of the potentially serious health consequences of untreated sleep-disordered breathing.

Source: ResMed Inc.

Sit 'n Sleep announces its sponsorship of SleepBook.com -- a new educational web site designed to educate people about the importance of quality sleep. Site visitors are encouraged to take a short, but comprehensive survey about their sleep habits. Once the survey is complete, a free, customized "Sleep Book" of approximately 35 to 40 pages is generated and delivered to the user's inbox.

Sleep Book users have two sleep survey choices -- instant or multi-day. The multi-day survey includes questions that are emailed over the course of three days and inquire about the user's previous night's sleep. The multi-day survey provides users an in-depth and detailed analysis of their sleep habits and quality.

Once the sleep survey is complete, users receive a customized Sleep Book outlining how the person is sleeping now and how he or she can sleep better in the future. The book addresses dreams, environment, sleep routine, diet, and more.

The Sleep Book is filled with individually-tailored sleep health advice, and also includes a wide range of tips and strategies for achieving a better night's sleep.

Of course, the sleeper's mattress plays a large role in the level of sleep quality.

"At Sit 'n Sleep, our top priority is to help people in Southern California to sleep better," Larry Miller, president of Sit 'n Sleep says. "Our sleep consultants know that a mattress is only as good as the quality of sleep people get from it."

Sit 'n Sleep is the largest mattress retailer in Southern California and the company's commitment to sleep health is unsurpassed.

"We're the only mattress retailer in Southern California to use a sophisticated body diagnostic machine in all of our store locations," Miller adds. "Our body diagnostic machine makes more than 17,000 calculations to match sleepers with an optimal mattress type. The data is amazing."

So, when the diagnostic machine data is coupled with the sleep survey data, a SleepBook.com user is well on his or her way to resting easier.

The Sleep Book and interactive survey were conceptualized and developed by William Fernandez, Director of Interactive Marketing for Wingman Media, a full-service retail advertising agency.

Visit: www.sleepbook.com.

Atlanta has been named as the worst city for sleeping, followed by Nashville, Houston, New York and St. Louis. This was the finding of a new research study based on survey data, and the factors that cause sleep deprivation, like commute time, divorce and unemployment rates.

The best cities for sleeping are Anaheim, Los Angeles, Raleigh-Durham, N.C., Minneapolis and Chicago.

Atlanta residents reported an average of 9.7 days of poor sleep each month, more than the 8.4 average reported for the 50 metropolitan areas studied. The commute time was about 34 minutes in Atlanta, above the 30 minute average. Divorce and unemployment rates were slightly above average as well.

The report was put together by Bert Sperling, a researcher who has compiled lists of "best places" to work, live and play for Money and Newsweek magazines and other publications. For this report, he drew information from a national telephone survey done by the federal government and from a demographic research firm and from government statistics.

Sanofi-Aventis, a drug company that makes a sleeping pill, funded this latest report.

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Some scientists now believe that dreaming is a way of sorting through our emotions and integrating the events of our lives into our memories -- something we sometimes can't do when we're awake.

"It's like in waking, we're stuck in a rut. We think in straight lines. It's white or black," says Dr. Ernest Hartmann, a psychiatrist at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston and author of nine books on sleeping and dreaming. "A dream is another form of mental functioning, mental processing -- it's our subconscious presenting things differently and more broadly."

Gillian Holloway, who has a doctorate in psychology and is author of "The Complete Dream Book" (Sourcebooks, $14.95) also believes in the common saying, "Sleep on it." From a simple decision such as adopting a new pet to complicated ones such as making a career decision or moving across the country, dreams can help you make the right choice, she says.

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Did the sleep deprivation of the the lone air traffic controller have anything to do with the Comair crash? A federal investigator said the controller on duty the morning Comair Flight 5191 crashed had only two hours of sleep before starting work on the overnight shift.

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) member Debbie Hersman said the controller had only nine hours off between work shifts on Saturday. That was just enough to meet federal rules, which require a minimum of eight hours off between shifts, Hersman said.

"He advised our team that he got approximately two hours of sleep," Hersman said on Wednesday.

The commuter jet crashed on Sunday morning, in the final hours of the controller's shift, while trying to take off from Blue Grass Airport.

Federal officials have been looking for explanations why Flight 5191 mistakenly tried to take off from a runway that was too short, crashing in a nearby field and killing 49 of 50 people on board.

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The Howstuffworks page about sleep is really interesting, and answers questions like why we all need to sleep, or what causes dreams. The article goes on to explain, with the help of a diagram, the 5 stages of the sleep cycle. Also, lucid explanation of other concepts, such as REM sleep, and what happens when we don't get enough sleep.

For all of us who would like to know the scientific explanation of sleep, explained in a language that we can understand, this is a valuable source.

Hospitals are supposed to help patients to relax and recover, but in reality, noise levels may prevent patients from getting rest. Now the Montefiore Hospital in New York has initiated a new program to reduce noise levels and help patients sleep better.

The sources of noise were abundant at Montefiore, including ringing telephones, blaring televisions, hospital alarms, intercom announcements, and carts balancing on squeaky wheels.

"Studies have shown there is a relationship between excessive noise and a slowing of the healing process. Noise also contributes to increasing stress and anxiety levels." Nurse Margaret Amato-Hayes, clinical director of nursing at Montefiore, said. "Noise is not only an irritant, but an obstacle to healing." 

The hospital is trying out a new program called "Silent Hospitals Help Healing" (SHHH).

"All equipment, from IV poles to medication carts, is sent for lubrication and inspection," Nurse Elodia Mercier, the administrative nurse manager who implemented the program, said.

In addition to inspecting equipment, nursing managers are monitoring hallway conversations. Staff is advised to turn phones and beepers on vibrate. Even the intercom volume was decreased.

"The effects of SHHH have been remarkable," Mercier said. Noise within her unit was as high as 78 decibels. Now the levels are around 55, similar to that of a library. Overall decibels levels have fallen significantly since the program started.

"Within two weeks, patients said they were sleeping better, and staff told us they felt less stressed," Mercier said.

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About 5,600 people are killed each year in the U.S. in crashes involving commercial trucks. Many of these crashes happen when the driver falls asleep at the wheel.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine examined truck drivers and studied patterns of sleep and fatigue.

The study found that drivers who routinely slept less than five hours a night were likely to fare poorly on tests designed to measure sleepiness, attention and reaction time, and steering ability. Drivers with severe sleep apnea, a medical condition that causes a poor quality of sleep, also were sleepy and had performance impairment.

Allan Pack, MB, ChB, PhD, who headed the study, said the tired truck drivers had impaired performance similar to that of drivers who are legally drunk. "We identified some very impaired people," said Pack, a sleep expert who directs Penn's Center for Sleep and Respiratory Neurobiology.

Nearly five percent of the truckers had severe sleep apnea (a condition in which someone stops breathing often during sleep), and about 13 percent of the drivers got fewer than five hours of sleep a night on a regular basis. "There are daytime neurobehavioral performance impairments that are found commonly in commercial drivers, and these are more likely among those who get an average of five or less hours of sleep a night and those who suffer from severe obstructive sleep apnea," the researchers concluded.

Penn researchers are now suggesting specific steps for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to take to improve safety:

• Develop strategies to identify impaired drivers through objective testing.
• Implement programs to identify and test drivers with severe sleep apnea and monitor that they stick to their treatment.
• Introduce programs to assess and promote longer durations of sleep among commercial drivers.

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A recent Ipsos-Reid survey reveals that 58% of Canadians prefer a good night's sleep to a good night of sex. The Nutritional Health Review Magazine survey found that 47% of women over the age of 45 would rather ger more sleep than sexual activity. A 2001 survey by Durex showed that a majority of people in Thailand prefer sleeping to sex.

Internationally, it seems to be emerging that naptime is often preferred over sex. Couples are so exhausted dealing with work related or children related demands that there is little energy left for sexual activities.

This seems to be most common for couples between the ages of 25 and 35, who are always busy commuting, traveling, working, taking care of kids and housework, or surfing the net.