Another Way to Fall Asleep?

Many people complain about difficulty in falling asleep. (Of course, they complain about staying asleep and waking too soon, but those are different problems.) The falling-asleep time is known technically as ‘sleep onset latency’ (SOL), and it can be improved, or shortened, like the other sleep problems, using cognitive behavioral therapy. But Australian researches wondered if there could be another approach – changing the content of the evening meal. In a study reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition they describe how a high-glycemic index meal taken 4 hours before bedtime had the effect of almost halving the time taken to fall asleep, from an average of 17½ minutes to 5 minutes. The comparison was between two meals that had the same total calories and included 600 g of steamed rice; the rice was either a low or high glycemic index (values of 50 and 109, respectively).

The reason given for this effect is that a higher glycemic food leads to elevated glucose and insulin blood levels; increased insulin produces higher tryptophan brain levels, which in turn raises serotonin (which has sleep-activating properties) and changes in brain melatonin levels.

This study was done in 12 young healthy males. If it can be shown that high-glycemic index food has a similar effect in older people (men and women) with sleep problems, it might make a dent in the sales of popular sleeping pills – which would be a good thing.

Comments

[Michael Roberts]

You can help to improve your sleep problems, by making sure you have the correct intake of vitamins B1, B2, niacin, vitamin B6, folate, vitamin C, magnesium, and zinc, and by stabilizing your blood sugar level.