When I was at the Stanford cardiac unit last, they let me sleep. That wasn't the problem but they had a problem giving me privacy: door wide open, curtain wide open.
Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
21–30 of 528 posts
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#22Not only are they "designed to allow patients as little sleep as possible", but also doctors too. Residents and doctors frequently have take on 30-36 hour shifts.. How they could effectively treat patients with this level sleep deprivation is beyond me. Maybe hospitals just have a vendetta on sleep in general?
It's because doctor handovers are surprisingly dangerous.
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#23Anecdotally this seems like it's probably a real problem, but doesn't he only have a sample size of one hospital stay?
In a word, no. Until they start getting lawsuits over contempt for sleep, nothing will improve.
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#24For the birth of my second child, I learned to manage hospital staff so that they would leave my wife and newborn alone unless there was an emergency. I proactively scheduled scans, vital checks for the next morning so that the patients could rest. The experience was so much better than what my wife and first child had. I do not understand why hospitals cannot do this kind of considerate scheduling by default.
Can you elaborate on how you worked with the hospital staff to make this "considerate scheduling" possible?
My initial feeling would be that the staff will do their jobs when it convenient for them to do it, regardless of when you would prefer them to do it. How did you manage to convince them to modify their scheduling?
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#25I felt the question and answer to be a little flippant, which is fine, but hear this: Sometimes there are reasons, very genuine reasons. I've been recovering from a recent stay. I, too, was interrupted frequently - every 45 minutes in fact. After a few nods off and being woken up by a knock at the door repeatedly I asked 'why' and the staff gently explained that me sleeping for too long would be a bad idea for a few…
I don't think all hospital patients meet all (or even any) of the three points you listed. Hospitals should wake up folks that actually need it (e.g. folks like you in your past situation), and leave those who don't need it alone to sleep.
I mostly agree. The author of the piece didn't go into much detail about their medical needs at the time - perhaps they were a high-attention patient and didn't know it? Hence my call to educate oneself about their own situation. When you're in a foreign bed/room, in some amount of discomfort, on (likely) new medicine, you probably aren't the best judge of neediness and intent. The best you can do is ask and see what you can do to make the situation better.
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#26The article quotes a doctor speaking about nursing care. This is as accurate as asking an automotive engineer about automobile repair. Same field, different skill sets. Nurses are trained to identify trends across many (sometimes too many) patients. Sure its inconvenient if a nurse monitors your blood pressure or oxygen levels every 2 hours after surgery, especially when you are sleeping, and especially if you recove…
> Same with audio on machines, that constant beep is annoying to you, but it means the machines are operating and you are getting your prescribed fluids - silence on a night ward is a sign something is wrong, and quickly precedes an emergency alarm.
Sure, if there is one source of beeps, then no beeps would be conspicuous, but when there are many things all beeping, having one of them stop beeping may not be so obvious at all.
A simple technological solution seems appropriate here. Have each machine that needs to work check in every couple seconds with each of two centralized monitoring machines. Have each monitoring machine alert the nurse desk if a monitored machine stops checking in. This is silent and has no single point of failure.
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#27My wife just finished up a 22 hour labor and is desperately trying to get some sleep but the nurses refuse to stop yelling and laughing directly outside of her door. It’s not even medical. Just rude.
Ask them to stop, perhaps?
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#28When my wife was in the hospital after the birth of both our two kids (premature so they weren't in the room with her to care for, they were in the NICU).... I chose to go home to sleep as the nurses just came and went endlessly. Someone had to get sleep. Then my oldest son was in the hospital for a while. He was sick so I wasn't too surprised he was napping all the time until spent a few nights sleeping at the hospi…
There are preliminary results showing that when the NICU dims it's lights during the day and goes even darker at night babies recover faster. 5 weeks faster on average. (That's from "Why We Sleep")
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#29My wife just finished up a 22 hour labor and is desperately trying to get some sleep but the nurses refuse to stop yelling and laughing directly outside of her door. It’s not even medical. Just rude.
Congratulations!
Talk to the charge nurse to change rooms, escalate to the admin on call if needed. Get the sleep now while you can.
Re: Why Do Hospitals Hate Sleep So Much?
#30For both of our children, the hospital caused us more stress and discomfort than anything else. Newborn baby's finally asleep, wife is comfortable re pain, finally start to get some sleep.
Then the nurse comes in at 2 am, writes her name on the board, asks us questions that they should have the answer to, then leaves.
Nurse change 3x a day, baby doctor checking in to ask if were ok, mom doctor doing the same, house keeping, meal people 3x a day. Plus any legitimate and needed medical attention e.g. baby shots/bath /moms wound dressing change
With our second, insurance would've covered another 2-3 days in the hospital, but my wife nearly had a mental breakdown between normal post partum depression, nursing difficulties, and people interrupting every quiet moment we have with our new family member, so we left asap.