![]() During that growth, the original sofa and easy chairs in the nap room have transformed into a high-tech, computer-controlled Z-lounge, complete with a virtual relaxation system that provides frazzled workers with soothing sounds, vibrations, and visual images of rain forests, waterfalls, and babbling brooks. ![]() Since its launch in Yarde’s basement, the company has expanded to include a new corporate headquarters and multiple buildings in the nearby town of Southington, as well as 7 facilities throughout the East Coast, and international operations. Shortly thereafter, the Associated Press 34 disseminated the early story of this business practice somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but when the New York Times 35 followed up 8 years later Mr Yarde reported that his napping program has proven good for morale, productivity, and his workers’ health. ![]() Craig Yarde, who founded the company in 1976, began using nap rooms around 1997. One noteworthy example can be found at Yarde Metals, a metal processing and distribution plant in Connecticut. Many big corporate names such as Nike, Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, and Deloitte Consulting offer employees the opportunity and some dedicated space to nap, but some of the early pioneers and believers in sleeping on the job have been small, local businesses who viewed their employees as valuable assets. Working the night shift requires considerable effort to overcome these natural circadian cycles, especially when sleeping during the daytime fails to fully compensate for the number of hours of night sleep lost, thereby creating a sleep debt that is cumulative in nature and protracted in duration. These rhythms, strongly influenced by natural cycles of daylight and darkness, stimulate release of melatonin from the pineal gland, which lowers alertness and readies the body for sleep. So would naps occurring during nighttime hours help those who work at that time? As you may recall from descriptions of circadian cycles, the sprachiasmatic nuclei in the hypothalamus functions as an endogenous circadian pacemaker, driving roughly 24-hour cycles of alertness during the day and sleepiness at night via a myriad of physiological processes including those for body temperature, hormone synthesis, and wakefulness. Since we typically sleep at night, much of the literature related to naps refers to brief periods of sleep that occur during daytime or afternoon hours. 31 In addition, a recently released study of 23681 healthy Greek men and women between the ages of 20 and 86 found that those who took naps of more than 30 minutes 3 or more times per week had a 37% lower risk of dying from heart disease than those who did not take afternoon naps and those who took naps of any frequency and of any duration demonstrated a 34% lower risk of dying from heart disease. In order to maximize these beneficial effects and avoid the performance dip associated with longer periods of sleep, many nap advocates prefer the shorter, so-called “power nap.” Before jumping to any premature conclusions regarding the sweet spot for nap duration, however, readers need to be aware that comparably excellent results (fewer performance lapses, less fatigue, less sleepiness, greater vigor, more efficient clinical performance on a simulated venipuncture, and safer performance in a simulated driving test) have been achieved with emergency department physicians and nurses using a nap duration of 40 minutes.
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