For most of us, a prescription pill is the concrete symbol of modern medicine. One-third of the population experiences sleeping problems and half of that number are motivated enough by their distress to take their problem to a physician. Nothing I have ever read recommends the use of sleeping pills for anything other than a short term solution to a sleeping problem. Why is it that we all know people who take sleeping pills every night of their lives? Ask any pharmacist, and you will find that many people take sleeping pills for prolonged periods of time. Why are these people being prescribed this medication for extended periods? Maybe the answer is that their doctors are aware of no acceptable solution other than to dispense sleeping pills. The doctor knows their patients have to sleep.
Regular use of sleeping pills is no longer considered safe or appropriate due to their undesirable and potentially dangerous side effects. Furthermore, sleeping pills are only moderately effective for insomnia and do not help insomniacs become normal sleepers. Sleeping pills also fail to treat the cause of insomnia. Because they treat only insomnia's symptoms, any improvement in sleep can only be temporary, thereby perpetuating the cycle of insomnia and sleeping pills. The insomnia can end up being much worse than if the medication were withheld. Sleeping pills are not the answer to chronic insomnia. However, sleeping pills can become a trap that escalates feelings of dependency, lowered self esteem, and guilt. You end up having to cope with two stressful problems: insomnia and dependency on sleeping pills.
When many medications are used regularly for even a short period of time, there can be a loss of effectiveness due to adjustments made by the user's body known as tolerance. Increasing doses of a medication are necessary to sustain the initial effectiveness the drugs produced. While sleep medicine may work in the short term, the dosage must be increased or a new medication must be substituted to produce the same results. Ultimately, the insomnia can return even with the continued use of the medication, plus there is the real possibility of drug dependence.
Most people who take a sleeping pill believe that they take it and like magic it puts them to sleep. If only it was that easy. What actually happens is that you take a pill; it has to dissolve in your intestinal tract, get absorbed, pass through and get broken down by the liver, make its way into the blood, then to the brain, where it attaches to receptors. Throughout this process, the body tries to rid itself of the chemical. People are surprised to learn that a sleeping pill will not put them to sleep the moment after they have swallowed it.
Problems of safety, negative side effects, upsetting effects on sleep stages, dependency and addiction tendencies, interactions with other drugs, limited duration of effectiveness, and rebound and withdrawal complications all hinder the successful employment of sleeping pills for sleep disorders.
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