Sleep 101: The Ultimate Guide on How to Get a Better Night’s Sleep
By Sarah DiGiulio
Medically Reviewed by Samuel Mackenzie, MD, PhD
We do it every night, and over the course of our life we will spend approximately a third of our time doing it: sleep. But what is it? Doctors and scientists are really just beginning to understand all the important ways that sleep affects our health and well-being — and all of the reasons we do it.
According to Rafael Pelayo, MD, clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and a sleep specialist at the Stanford Sleep Medicine Center in Redwood City, California, “Sleep is a natural, restorative, physiological process characterized by a perceptual disengagement [meaning you tune out from whatever’s going on around you], and must be rapidly reversible.â€
Sleep experts at Harvard Medical School’s Division of Sleep Medicine use a similar definition for sleep. They say it can be characterized as: (1)
https://www.everydayhealth.com/sleep-disorders/sleep/sleep-101-ultimate-guide-on-how-get-better-nights-sleep/?iid=gnav_hl_sleep
