Sleep and Schizophrenia

Interesting Facts:

• 95% schizophrenic persons smoke cigarettes.
• Cigarettes interfere with sleep quality.
• Nicotine patches interfere with sleep quality.
• Research in the UK links smoking mothers to be with a 20% increase in offspring with psychosis.
• Anti psychotic medication functions differently when a patient stops smoking.
• Most schizophrenics drink excessive amounts of caffeine, mostly coffee and coke. In certain areas of the brain, caffeine and nicotine enhance the transmission of dopamine, the main neurotransmitter involved in schizophrenia and the site of anti-psychotic medications. When dopamine rages, it can lead to psychosis.
• In a sample of 146 patients with schizophrenia from Pennsylvania, the rates of smoking were more than twice as high than the general United States population (59.6% vs. 23.4%). The study participants also reported smoking more cigarettes (24 vs. 13.5) and ingesting more caffeine (471.6mg vs. 254.2mg) at a rate of about ten more cigarettes and two more cups of coffee each day.
• Caffeine interferes with the sleep process.  One recent study shows that subjects fell asleep more easily when they were not ingesting caffeine, while another other shows that the duration and quality of sleep were improved on non-caffeine days.
• Schizophrenia is associated with increases in Dopamine whereas Parkinsons disease is associated with decreases in Dopamine.
• A reduced risk for Parkinson’s disease (PD) among cigarette smokers has been observed consistently during the past 30 years. Recent evidence suggests that caffeine may also be protective.
• Poor diets deficient in certain nutrients have been shown to contribute to poor sleep.
• Schizophrenic persons often have low nutrient diets.  Poor nutrition elevates homocysteine levels.
• There has previously been found that there is a marked elevation of plasma homocysteine in young male schizophrenic patients in hospital. Serum homocysteine levels were studied in 184 consecutively admitted schizophrenic patients and 305 control subjects from an employee screening program. Homocysteine levels were markedly increased in this population of newly admitted schizophrenic patients, especially in young males. Newly admitted male schizophrenic patients have elevated homocysteine levels that cannot be explained on the basis of poor hospital nutrition. Smoking may raise homocysteine by 1–2 μM/L but this is not a large enough effect to explain our findings.
• Some researchers have already shown a link between folic acid and schizophrenia.
• Psychosis is usually preceded by high levels of stress.
• Stress interferes with sleep quality.”The prevalence of insomnia may, in fact, be the result of deteriorating sleep mechanisms associated with increased sensitivity to arousal-producing stress hormones, such as CRH and cortisol.

• During times of great stress schizophrenic persons display extremely poor sleep habits.
• The siblings of schizophrenic persons often exhibit strange dreaming phenomena.
• Schizophrenics often liken there symptoms to dreaming while awake.
• Schizophrenia often appears during adolescence.
• Adolescents have marked changes in need for length of sleep and their circadian rhythm changes.
• Schizophrenics have biological body temperature control problems.
• Biological body temperature regulation changes when a person is sleeping.
• Persons abusing barbiturates become psychotic.
• Barbiturates decrease REM sleep.
• Heavy marijuana use is linked to psychosis and schizophrenia.
• During discontinuation of heavy heavy marijuana use, PSG measures of sleep disturbance were detected in heavy marijuana users compared with a drug free control group.
• New mums have lots of sleepless nights but new research suggests that a lack of sleep could place them at greater risk of suffering from postnatal psychosis.
• Schizophrenia could simply be a sleep disorder.
• First degree relatives of schizophrenic persons often suffer from recurrent nightmares.