Considering melatonin is one of the three active ingredients in Dream Water, we are always happy to share the latest news and research surrounding melatonin and it’s direct effects on sleep. The latest news we’ve uncovered shows a correlation to low melatonin levels – and thus, trouble sleeping – with people who have experienced brain trauma.
The study itself was performed by Shantha Rajaratnam, PhD, of Monash University in Victoria, Australia, and was published in the medical print journal Neurology – a publication of The American Academy of Neurology. The researchers compared the sleep patterns of patients that had experienced traumatic head injuries and those who have not. Over the course of their observations, they found a significant difference in the two groups. Not only did the healthy participants have higher levels of melatonin in the evening, but they were able to fall asleep faster and with greater ease than the brain injured participants. On average, the brain trauma participants took 62 minutes to fall asleep whereas the healthy group took on average 27 minutes. The brain injured group also spent more time in non-REM sleep, or the light-sleep cycle. Considering the brain’s role in regulating sleep patterns and melatonin’s powerful effect on sleep, it is no surprise that the brain injury group did experience radically different sleep patterns.
Research author Dr. Rajaratnam comments, “We’ve known that people often have problems with sleep after a brain injury, but we haven’t known much about the exact causes of these problems… These results suggest that the brain injury may disrupt the brain structures that regulate sleep, including the production of melatonin. Future studies should examine whether taking supplemental melatonin can improve sleep in people with brain injuries.”