It is 9AM of finals week, and at a typical college campus, students are most likely dragging their feet to class, disheveled with a glazed look of exhaustion in their eyes. This is the picture of sleep deprivation. College students, as well as a large portion of America's population, know the feeling all too well.

Studies say that adults, on average, should obtain approximately eight hours of sleep a night to function optimally. However, according to a 2001 poll taken by the Washington D.C. National Sleep Foundation, sixty-three percent of adults in the United States do not get the recommended eight hours of sleep a night (1).

Sleep deprivation has a wide range of effects including neurobehavioral and cognitive degradations. Alertness and awareness become unstable, and breaks in attention become more frequent. Cognitive abilities slow down, memory weakens, and as time proceeds, more errors occur. Individuals who are sleep-deprived may be able to begin working at a level of high performance, but their efficiency and accuracy deteriorate quickly.

The direct health effects of sleep deprivation are also substantial. According to a 2001 survey by the National Sleep Foundation, a number of medical conditions were found to be linked to sleep deprivation, including depression, nighttime heartburn, diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease (3). Sleep deprivation was also shown to speed up the aging process and potentially result in memory loss and eventual obesity. The American Diabetes Association stated that sleep deprivation can actually increase one's risk of developing diabetes, demonstrating in a study that chronic sleep deprivation can reduce insulin functionality by 40 percent in healthy young adults (4).

The issue of sleep deprivation and its impact on people's performance has become a topic of serious discussion among health professionals. In the United States, most training physicians work 80 or more hour weeks with shifts of greater than 30 consecutive hours every third or fourth night (2). Approximately 80% of physicians and 20% of dentists find themselves in training programs that have such requirements (2).

It is not surprising that scientists have been investigating anti-sleep drugs. The most recent drug that has entered the limelight is modafinil, a stimulant that is currently prescribed to treat narcolepsy. Modafinil has been found to work for healthy sleep-deprived persons as well by increasing awareness and wakefulness, allowing them to think clearly and function at optimal levels despite lack of sleep. However, there are short-term side effects that include mild headaches, dizziness, and nausea and the long-term side effects of the drug are currently unknown (5).

In this fast-paced society, is the solution to fatigue found in a pill? Anti-sleep drugs may temporarily fool the body into working at peak performance while fatigued, but it is only a short-term solution. Eventually the lack of sleep will take its toll. There is only one real solution to sleep deprivation -- spending time to get an adequate night's sleep.

Peggy is a second-year student in the GPPA-Medicine program. She is double-majoring in biological sciences and psychology.