Can We really go without REM sleep?

[awritersmind1]

There seems to be a great deal of controversy about REM sleep. My doctor stated that we don't even REM sleep. That goes against anything that I have learned. Now, my doctor graduated from med school in the 1960s...

Does anyone know of the latest research on the necessity of REM sleep?

[Emilia]

I only had 3% REM in my sleep study. Kinda explained why I was a zombie after 'sleeping' all night! REM is the restorative part of the sleep cycle. Now I sleep deeply, get my dreamy REM, and wake up refreshed. So.... yes, REM is an important part of one's sleep pattern, and it is important to get enough of it.

From Wikipedia:
REM sleep in adult humans typically occupies 20–25% of total sleep, about 90–120 minutes of a night's sleep. REM sleep normally occurs close to morning. During a normal night of sleep, humans usually experience about four or five periods of REM sleep; they are quite short at the beginning of the night and longer toward the end. Many animals and some people tend to wake, or experience a period of very light sleep, for a short time immediately after a bout of REM. The relative amount of REM sleep varies considerably with age. A newborn baby spends more than 80% of total sleep time in REM. During REM, the activity of the brain's neurons is quite similar to that during waking hours; for this reason, the REM-sleep stage may be called paradoxical sleep.

REM sleep is physiologically different from the other phases of sleep, which are collectively referred to as non-REM sleep (NREM sleep). Subjects' vividly recalled dreams mostly occur during REM sleep.

[awritersmind1]

Love the profile pic!

My REM was only 4% and that's where all my SDB is at. I read somewhere that REM refreshes your eyes as well. I'm starting to wonder if that's why I can't even hardly tolerate to have my eyes open. THey're burning like crazy. They do this whenever I'm really sleep deprived.

I just wonder why this doctor said I can go entirely without it and it won't matter.

[MaxDarkside]

Yes, I think we need REM. I have a silly way of looking at it. Deep sleep is where we are moving the furniture about in our minds. REM is when we are jumping up and down on it and running about trying to determine if it is in the right place. In a cognitive sense, I see it that during the day we accumulate experiences and during deep sleep, we filter though those, determine the big picture and move big concepts around and their inter-relationships. REM is where we do "What If?" scenarios to evaluate and try out these new structures to see how well they fit in different contrived situations (dreams) and if need be, go back into Deep to move them around again, then retest in another REM.

I may be all wet, but I like thinking of it that way.

[chunkyfrog]

They torture pople by depriving them of REM.
You need to find a doctor who didn't use daddy's money to squeak his way through med school.

[VikingGnome]

I had ZERO REM sleep during my sleep study AND CPAP titration. After 60 days on CPAP, I'm still have EDS and am mostly nonfunctional. Saw sleep doc today. She says it's my EFFEXOR to blame. So I have to get an earlier appt with my shrink to start titrating off Effexor. About the only antidepressant she felt I should be on is Trazadone. (She is board certified psychiatrist before becoming Sleep Medicine certified.)

During REM sleep we not only dream and have the most restorative sleep. Out bodies are paralyzed and don't move at all so you get 100% rest for muscles and joints during REM.

Is your doctor a sleep specialist or family practice Doc. If he finished medical school in the 60's and did a 4 year residency, how old is he?

18 hs + 4 college + 4 med school =26 years + (2012 - 1966) = He's 72 years old. Why are you seeing him?

[awritersmind1]

LOL! This is the doctor that my primary sent me to.

He is one of the directors of the main sleep center up here, it seems. But I was looking him up today. His fellowships and specialty training were in pediatric neurology. How is he a sleep specialist, then?

Not to be mean, but he seems more like pushing 90+... I sort of just got stuck with him. I saw their nurse practitioner first who specialized in sleep apnea but they won't let me in to see her again... I had to see this guy because he is the one who read my last test. I keep bothering this place to to get things moving, and it's not working. These women just sit there in the quiet and it's like, Hello, do you work? I'm afraid they are going to start thinking I'm nuts... I was thinking about getting a second opinion so I can start treatment, but then I would have to wait about another month for an appointment... and I can't wait that long. I feel horrible and it's very much so affecting my grades. I've been a straight A student all through college and now my grades are dropping because I just feel so miserable.

[robysue]

I was thinking about getting a second opinion so I can start treatment, but then I would have to wait about another month for an appointment... and I can't wait that long.

At this rate it's going to be a month (or more) before you start treatment if you stay with this doc or if you don't.

It's time to contact your insurance company and find out the names of other sleep docs that are in-network. Tell the insurance company that you are unhappy with quality of care you are receiving from this joker and his office staff and tell them exactly why you are unhappy with him.

Contact your primary care doctor and tell him you are dissatisfied with this particular sleep doc and his office and why. And ask for an emergency referral to another sleep doc. When you have an appointment with another sleep doc set up, sign the paperwork for the new doc to get access to your medical records at the old doc's office AND request copies of your medical records for your own records. Be sure to request the sleep test, including the full summary data and summary graphs (about 3-7 pages worth of stuff). I'd suggest making the request in writing rather than just by phone.

In the meantime, try to beg your primary care doc to prescribe an APAP set at 4-20cm for autotitration. That way you can start therapy and by the time you see the new sleep doc, there will be data for him/her to look at and s/he might be willing to write a formal prescription for the pressure level based on the autotitration data. And that would allow you to avoid a second (expensive) sleep study just for the titration.

I feel horrible and it's very much so affecting my grades. I've been a straight A student all through college and now my grades are dropping because I just feel so miserable.

I'm a college professor who used to be the chåir of a department. So I tell you this as someone who knows a thing or two about how colleges work.

If your grades are really going to be drastically below where they've been in the past, you should consider requesting a medical leave of absence for this semester. While the deadline to withdraw from your courses has undoubtably come and gone, students are usually allowed to withdraw from all their courses for medical reasons up to the last class day of the semester. The medical leave of absence will show up on your transcript as a semester where you withdrew from all your courses. The withdraw grades will typically not count towards your GPA. And even at places that distinguish between "Withdraw Passing" and "Withdraw Failing", medical leaves usually result in simple "Withdraws". The kind of person you want to talk to about this probably one of the deans at your college. Start with the Dean of Students office and the Dean of the school that contains the department that teaches the subject you are majoring in. (So for example, if you are a chemistry major, you're looking for someone called the Dean of Natural Sciences or some such thing.) This person's office should be able to give you the specific name of somebody who deals with students who need help negotiating the medical leave paperwork.

You will likely forfeit your tuition for the entire semester. And you'll have to pay the student loans anyway. But if you are failing or are close to failing half or more of your classes, it may be better to take the economic hit instead of the academic one.

[macewa]

In my sleep report it said that the pressures they used did not help me with my apneas. I am worse during REM - really bad. But I have always dreamed and I have always dreamed in color and have exciting and fasinating dreams. Actually my dream life is better than my real life. And I do remember most of my dreams so I guess that means that I am awake most of that time? would that be why I have all those peiodic breathing events? Once I dreamt I ran in a marathon and the next day my legs hurt like heck (calves). Would have thought I did run in a marathon. LOL Do I want to give up my dreams? not really because as I said, most of the times my dream life is better than my real l ife.

Love the profile pic!

My REM was only 4% and that's where all my SDB is at. I read somewhere that REM refreshes your eyes as well. I'm starting to wonder if that's why I can't even hardly tolerate to have my eyes open. THey're burning like crazy. They do this whenever I'm really sleep deprived.

I just wonder why this doctor said I can go entirely without it and it won't matter.

[avi123]

There seems to be a great deal of controversy about REM sleep. My doctor stated that we don't even REM sleep. That goes against anything that I have learned. Now, my doctor graduated from med school in the 1960s...

Does anyone know of the latest research on the necessity of REM sleep?

Reply,

As of last year the PA of a friendly Neurologist (very good and busy) told me that many persons are devoid of REMs and suffer fragmented sleep during their entire lives. Next time I see this PA I'll get more info.

Interesting article on it:

http://www.sleep-problems.org/Disorder- ... Sleep.html

[cindjo717]

It's so strange but before my sleep apnea was treated I had extremely vivid dreams.. I could recall a lot of them too. Now that I am controlled and getting good sound sleep, I do dream but I can't remember them as vividly. I still have recall but it's much more brief and not as often, nor as vivid as before. Maybe it was the loss of O2 that did it for me.

[BlackSpinner]

Of course you don't need REM sleep, as long as you don't expect to have any memory and behave a in a normal manner. There have been lots of studies about what REM sleep does. All of them state that it is absolutely necessary for healthy functioning. If you don't get it at night you will automatically do it during the day, randomly and involuntarily.

[JohnBFisher]

There seems to be a great deal of controversy about REM sleep. My doctor stated that we don't even REM sleep. That goes against anything that I have learned. Now, my doctor graduated from med school in the 1960s...

Does anyone know of the latest research on the necessity of REM sleep?

First, find another doctor. There is a LOT of evidence that loss of REM sleep will cause serious psychological harm.

Personally, I know that when I was first diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea, I was so starved for REM sleep that I would dream when I blinked during the day. Talk about scary. No matter how quickly it occurred, it always took a few moments to reorient myself when I came out of it. Scary!

There is a LOT of research that says "Yes, you NEED the REM sleep!" .. and it convincingly says that without the REM sleep psychological damage can occur as well as severe health problems.

So, I repeat .. find another doctor.

[kteague]

Just out of curiosity, I went over to PubMed and entered the search terms "REM deprivation" and found tons of interesting reading. Even if a person could survive without REM, I'm guessing one wouldn't thrive without it, and the quality of that life would be compromised. I take issue with any doctor who is sastified that one be condemned to a REM-less subsistence rather than fight for their patient to have the best possible life medical treatment could offer. Shame on this doctor.

As always I end up diverted on PubMed because the topics can be so intertwined. I did not realize that sleep deprivation affects dopamine transmitters, so I've got some more delving to do, since it is thought dopamine transmission could be at issue with PLMD.

[awritersmind1]

I actually just had a few research hypotheses come to me as a result of this discussion.

Research has shown that REM sleep deprivation led people to develop psychiatric symptoms. Now, antidepressants are known for reducing REM sleep and the doctor felt that this sort of thing is nothing to worry about. However, have people actually been monitored and followed for years to see what the results of this reduction is? Also, there have been lawsuits because people on antidepressants have committed suicide, etc. Could the adverse effect actually be a result of this REM sleep deprivation that these medicines cause?

Maybe it's totally bogus thoughts, but it has me wondering now.