How To Tackle Insomnia and Get a Good Night of Sleep
Millions of people around the world regularly suffer insomnia. They might struggle to fall asleep or be unable to maintain a long enough sleep to feel adequately refreshed to be motivated and active afterwards.
This article aims to highlight some complimentary therapies that might help sufferers in addition to mentioning those, that the evidence suggests, wont help to combat insomnia.
According to a recently published report in the UK newspaper The Daily Mail the following treatments may work according to various scientific studies:
Melatonin is a hormone that helps to regulate the human 'body clock' and studies have apparently shown that melatonin can actually improve the quality of sleep enjoyed (most notably in the elderly). For the body to feel rested and refreshed the quality of sleep attained is believed to be as important as the amount of sleep gained.
Self Hypnosis or hypnotherapy has been shown to significantly reduce problems for many insomnia sufferers. It may be able to help with any difficulty in getting to sleep in addition to the quality of sleep gained.
Valerian is believed to have a sedative effect on insomina sufferers. Studies suggest the Valerian root can make it very much easier to fall asleep and then goes on to improve the deep recouperative sleep insomnia sufferers very often lack.
Relaxation may seem an obvious form of treatment but apparently studies have shown that therapies like progressive muscle relaxation - where a subject places their specific focus on relaxing one group of muscles in the body at a time - can significantly reduce the problems people have with their sleep and sleeping patterns.
A recent report on the BBC website reveals that drinking beetroot juice can have many benefits among which is a lowering of the body's blood pressure. A lower blood pressure may in turn may lead to a more restful and regular sleep pattern for some insomnia sufferers. The study also found drinking beetroot juice significantly improved physical stamina among those tested.
To combat the daytime tiredness which can result from a poor quality night's sleep insomniacs can eat
To combat any stress that may be an underlying cause of insomnia drinking some fresh lemon juice diluted in hot water has been shown by a study in Japan to reduce the effects of stress. This benefit is attributed to the linalool compound found in lemon juice.
Less successful remedies that have at ne time or another been suggested to help overcome insomnia include hops. Although they are believed by some to have sedative properties there is apparently no scientific evidence to back this up. Another complimentary treatment sometimes recommended is acupuncture, where needles are inserted in specific points of the skin to relive symptoms. Apparently studies have again found no evidence to suggest this treatment is effective to tackle insomina. 22.07.2010. 05:20
