Narcolepsy – Behavioral Treatments

Transcript

There are a few behavioral treatments that may work for narcoleptics. The first is simply sleep hygiene. This is good for everybody, but more so for narcoleptics what this simply means is that there’s attention to good nighttime sleeping. So going to bed at the same time at night, waking up at the same time in the morning, having a bedroom environment, that’s free of interruptions. So it’s cool. It’s quiet. It’s calm, it’s comfortable. It makes sense to avoid excess alcohol, which can certainly have an effect on our nervous system and be moderate about caffeine and use it judiciously. It makes sense the body likes to have regularity. So if there’s going to be caffeine involved, it should be about the same doses every day. Not too much one day, not too little another, because this will affect the mood and the energy of a narcoleptic. Even more than the average person. One thing that’s very important for narcoleptics is scheduled naps which can be very restorative and really bust that excessive daytime sleepiness. So if naps are built into the day, they can have a burst of energy and feel good for quite a few hours. Those naps may be hard to come by in our busy lives, but sometimes they need to be negotiated into the work schedule and the life schedule. So the rest of the day functions well.