Specialist: Ballard students suffering for the sleep they aren't getting | Health

Naturopathic sleep specialist and Ballard resident Catherine Darley is on a mission, and she won’t rest until she has accomplished it. Actually, she probably will get a solid night’s rest, and she wants to make sure Seattle’s school children do, too.

“I’m on a mission to increase awareness of children’s sleep health and how it impacts their school success,” said Darley, who will be giving a talk to the Whitman Middle School PTA at 7:30 p.m. March 24 at Whitman.

Most parents don’t know how much sleep their children should be getting every night – 10 hours to 11 hours for children 6 to 12 and nine hours to 9.5 hours for teens, she said.

Darley said Insufficient sleep is the most common sleep problem for children. She said only 43 percent of grade school students get the amount of sleep they need. That number drops to 20 percent by the time those students hit high school and plummets further to 9 percent by senior year.

“It’s a little frustrating to know we have the medical knowledge, but it’s not impacting people’s lives,” Darley said.

According to the Sleep in America poll, conduction by the National Sleep Foundation for the March 7 start of National Sleep Awareness Week, teens are only getting an average of seven hours and 26 minutes of sleep on school nights.

“When students don’t get enough sleep, their cognitive abilities, social skills and physical performance are impaired,” she said. “This is just at the time they need all these skills to start a positive life path.”

Sleep-deprived students can find themselves struggling with everything from multiplication tables to complex problem solving, Darley said. Outside of school, lack of sleep can affect performance in sports and leads to greater risk taking, especially in teenagers, she said.

Children getting less than 10 hours of sleep see a higher rate of playground injuries, and insufficient sleep is also connected to ADHD and obesity, Darley said.

She said children who have been diagnosed with ADHD have higher rates of sleep disorders, such as restless leg syndrome and obstructive sleep apnea. In the case of sleep apnea, once it has been diagnosed and cured, half of children are no longer able to be diagnosed with ADHD, she said.

Lack of sleep can change hunger patterns in children, leading to cravings for more food, especially fatty and sugary foods, Darley said. It also decreases exercise in children as they lack the energy required to be active, she said.

As technology, such as cell phones, emails and computers, becomes more prominent among younger and younger children, the sleep problem gets worse, Darley said.

“Part of the problem is there are so many things vying for students’ time,” she said.

According to the Sleep in America poll, 56 percent of kids are texting right before bed, and 22 percent of people 13 to 29 are awoken by a text, phone call or email several nights per week.

Light exposure, such as that from a computer screen or television, pushes back children’s biological clock, making them feel less sleepy when it’s time for bed but much more sleepy the following day, Darley said.

Beyond technology, a simple lack of sleep education in adults and students is a major hurdle in correcting insufficient sleep, she said.

During puberty, teenagers’ biological clock gets shifted to a later schedule, making early school start times hard on them, Darley said. When Minnesota schools experimented with later start times, they saw decreased attendance problems and increased graduation rates, she said.

Darley said it’s sad when parents label their teens lazy for sleeping in to seemingly late hours.

“It’s just their biological clock,” she said. “It’s a bum rap.”

For parents concerned about the amount of sleep their child is getting, Darley recommends they observe how long their child sleeps on the weekend or on vacation – that’s how much sleep they probably need.

If a 9-year-old is sleeping for 10 hours on Saturday night and has to get up for school at 7 a.m. on a weekday, they should be going to bed at 9 p.m. every weeknight, Darley said. And, they should not be allowed to text or use the computer for the hour before that, she said.

Darley also recommends tapping into a student’s motivation. If they want to do well on their tennis team, let them know how a lack of sleep will affect negatively affect that goal.

 But, it’s not just insufficient sleep that can negatively impact children. They can also suffer from insomnia, restless leg syndrome and other disorders, Darley said.

She said one sign that a child should be evaluating as if he or she is snoring as a grade-schooler or younger.

Darley has spent the last few years trying raise awareness of sleep issues in school children. She is averaging about three talks to parent groups per year but wants to do more.

“It’s kind of difficult to reach parenting populations,” she said. “They have other things they want to learn about, like bullying and best parenting practices.”

Any school PTAs or parenting groups that are interested in having Darley speak should contact her at drdarley@naturalsleepmedicine.net. Whitman parents and students are welcome to attend her March 24 talk at 7:30 p.m. at Whitman.