A good night’s sleep is much more than a restful few hours of your life – it should be an important part of a healthy lifestyle. Getting enough sleep has many benefits - increased immunity, improved heart health, maintain healthy weight, reduced stress, better decision making to name a few. Depriving your body of sleep has been linked to many issues such as higher mortality, risk of cancer, heart disease, weight gain, rate of infection, Alzheimer’s, irritability and inflammation.
When it comes to sleep, both quantity and quality of sleep is important. Adults require 8 hours of sleep to function properly and school-going children need 11 hours of sleep each night. You should make changes to your lifestyle and schedule if you cannot find enough time to sleep. Getting enough sleep is not just how long but also how well you are sleeping every night.
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12 - 16 hours
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11 - 14 hours
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10 - 13 hours
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9 - 12 hours
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8 - 10 hours
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7+ hours
The common symptoms of a low quality sleep are feeling tired after a good night’s sleep, sleepiness during the day – at work or while driving, frequent loud snoring and pauses, gasps or choke while breathing during sleep. Out of these symptoms, snoring is often a clear signal that there is something is wrong with your breathing and that you need to see a specialist.
Dental sleep medicine is an area of dental practice that focuses on the use of oral appliance therapy to treat sleep-disordered breathing, including snoring and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Dentists work together with physicians to identify the best treatment for each patient.
At Wassan Specialty Dental Centre, we take a comprehensive approach to dental sleep medicine. We have qualified dental sleep medicine specialists for consultation and referral, partnership with sleep testing centers to understand how well you are sleeping and an in-house laboratory to manufacture customized oral appliances to help you sleep better. Book an appointment with our sleep specialist today to find out more.
Proven Tips to Sleep Better at Night
- Sleep and wake up at the same times every day.
- Reduce light before sleep. Blue light is the most harmful, but even bedside lamps cause issues. Artificial light delays the circadian rhythm by hours.
- Cool body temperature before sleep. The ideal sleeping temperature is 65F given standard bedding and clothes. Other tricks – expose your palms and feet while sleeping, take a hot bath before sleeping.
- Don’t drink alcohol unless it is completely metabolized by sleep time (including the aldehydes produced).
- Don’t drink caffeine at all [ha! good one], but especially not in afternoon.
- Don’t use alarms if you can help it. Alarms cause a huge stress reaction on waking. Snoozing causes repeated traumas every morning.
- Exercise regularly, but not 3 hours before sleep.
- Don’t rely on sleeping pills – these are usually just sedatives that put you more in a sedation state than sleep.
TAP
Treat sleep-disordered breathing with TAP Custom. Available in multiple hardware choices and three available tray liners, these premium, lab made devices are individually fabricated for personalized comfort.
The unique design of the TAP empowers patients to fine-tune treatment at home, as well as work with the clinician to achieve the best results. With a single point of central adjustment, the TAP prevents uneven bilateral adjustment that may create an irregular bite and jaw discomfort.
- Achieve healthier, more comfortable sleep with our newest and most effective TAP Custom oral appliance.
- More tongue space for greater comfort
- Cobalt-chromium hardware, stronger than surgical stainless steel
- Rust- and corrosion-resistant
- Nickel-free, 100% allergen-free metal
- TAP single-point, midline adjustment
- Three hook sizes for greater range of adjustment
- Custom-formed soft liners for superior retention