April/1998
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THE SLEEP Rx: 75 PROVEN WAYS TO GET A GOOD NIGHT'S SLEEP Norman Ford (Prentice Hall, 1994, 342 pp., $9.95)
Reviewed by Lynne Lamberg
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Health reporter Ford does a better job than Perl of telling readers that he has distilled information from numerous sources. Throughout the text, he uses phrases such as "studies show," or "sleep experts say."
Most of his 75 tips are workaday advice familiar to sleep specialists: change your sleeping position to reduce the intensity of apnea or snoring (don't sleep on your back); how to avoid jet lag insomnia (phase shift in advance; spend your first day outside); get enough sleep (wean yourself from television, "the single largest thief of sleep in modern life.")
The 75 prescriptions would carry more weight if uniformly written in the active voice; many are titled "how to...." and some merely are descriptive: "the best way to...."
Sleep specialists may find some of the author's assertions troubling, e.g., "the average shift worker who sleeps only 6 to 6.5 hours per night for a year loses 4 years in life expectancy and has a significantly higher risk of getting cancer or an infectious disease."
They also may have reservations about the author's advice to eliminate not only all fat from the diet but also all dairy products and refined carbohydrates. The author also recommends B vitamins, herbal teas, and other health food products for a variety of sleep disorders. There are no references at the end of the book and no bibliography.
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