Why You Should Never Even Consider Taking Sleeping Pills to Resolve Your Sleep Issues

A drawing of different types of medication in pill form

Many people around the developed world have resorted to sleeping pills in order to address their sleep issues such as insomnia. Unfortunately, taking sleeping pills does not provide natural sleep. Additionally, taking sleeping pills has significant risks for damaging your health and can cause life threatening diseases.

Why Sleeping Pills Are Ineffective To Resolve Sleep Issues

First of all, it is important to know that sleeping medication does not induce natural sleep. Sleeping pills are sedatives and (similarly to alcohol) they sedate rather than assist us to go to sleep. This is because they effectively knock out the higher regions of our brain. Studies indicate that the resulting “sleep” these drugs produce is severely lacking in the largest and deepest brainwaves.

The Numerous Side Effects of Sleeping Medication

Sleeping pills cause a lot of unwanted side effects. These side effects include severe grogginess and forgetfulness during the following day. Additionally, they cause overall reduced reaction times. This can have a big impact on important motor skills we use on a daily basis (e.g. driving). Furthermore, these side effects can cause a vicious cycle. This is because the grogginess can lead people to reach for caffeine throughout the day to be more alert. As a result, this makes it harder for them to fall asleep at night. Consequently, to battle their insomnia symptoms, these individuals then take more sleeping pills at night. In turn, this leads to more grogginess the next day, further aggravating the problem.

Other common side effects of sleep medication can include impaired cognition & memory, loss of appetite, constipation, nausea, diarrhea, dizziness, headache, heartburn, uncontrollable shaking, impaired balance, an overall feeling of weakness and weird dreams or nightmares.

A woman lying ill in bed

Rebound Insomnia and Withdrawal Symptoms Caused By Sleeping Pills

Another negative effect of taking sleeping pills is called rebound insomnia. As individuals (who take sleeping medication) become dependent on these drugs, their brains adjust the balance of receptors as a way to become less sensitive to the foreign chemical. Basically, the brain builds up a drug tolerance and when the intake of this sleeping drug is halted, this causes symptoms of withdrawal. These withdrawal symptoms include an unpleasant spike in severe insomnia.

Ironically, these insomnia symptoms are often worse than the poor sleep that led them to try out sleeping pills in the first place. This is because the majority of sleeping pills are highly addictive. When patients come off the drugs for a night, they have miserable sleep. This urges them to take the sleeping pill again the following night. This vicious cycle makes it very difficult to get rid of this detrimental habit.

The Ineffectiveness of Sleeping Pills as Proven By Scientific Studies

The worse part is that the individuals who take these sleeping pills only experience a very minor increase in sleep. Additionally, the quality of sleep is much worse than they think. In-depth studies illustrate that people taking sleeping pills overestimate the quality of their sleep. Furthermore, the time it takes for them to fall asleep is much longer than they think.

Sleep studies indicate that there is no statistically relevant benefit of taking sleeping pills in comparison with a placebo. Sleeping medication only produces minor improvement in the time it takes to fall asleep. Moreover, even the latest sleeping pills for insomnia such as suvorexant (brand name Belsomra) have proven to be minimally effective. Therefore, recent scientific data confirms that sleeping pills are not the answer for people suffering from chronic insomnia.

A man sitting outside suffering from anxiety

Severe Health Risks and Higher Mortality Rates Caused By Sleeping Pills

Not only are sleeping pills minimally helpful, they also are very harmful for your health. Numerous studies illustrate a variety of health consequences connected to the use of sleeping pills. A study on Ambien, a well-known sleeping pill, reports that Ambien-induced sleep causes a 50 percent weakening of the brain-cell connections formed during learning. In other words, taking Ambien as a sleeping pill causes you to wake up with fewer memories of the previous day.

An important severe consequence of taking sleeping medication that everybody should be aware of is the increased likelihood of death. This is indicated by numerous studies. A comprehensive study in 2012 revealed the causal relationship between sleeping pill use and mortality risk. The in-depth research took place over a period of two and a half years. More than 10,000 patients taking sleeping pills such as Ambien and Restoril were examined. These patients were compared with well-matched individuals of similar age, race, gender, and background, but who were not taking sleeping pills.

The results were mind blowing. Over this 2.5-year period, those individuals who were taking sleeping pills were 4.6 times more likely to die over this short period of time compared to those not taking sleeping pills. The more often individuals took sleeping pills, the higher the chance of death. Heavy users, taking more than 132 pills per year, were 5.3 times more likely to die over the 2.5-year period. Even the occasional users (less than 18 pills per year) were 3.6 times more likely to die compared to non-users. Since then, numerous other studies have conducted similar research. All of them indicate significantly higher mortality rates in individuals taking sleeping pills.

The Causes of High Mortality Rates as a Result of Taking Sleeping Pills

There are numerous causes for the high mortality rate connected to taking sleeping pills. An example is the increased likelihood of infection. This is because medication-induced sleep does not provide the same restorative immune benefits as natural sleep does. This is especially bad news for elderly people as they are more likely to suffer from infections. Additionally, seniors represent more than 50 percent of the individuals who take sleeping pills.

Additional causes of death linked to sleeping pills include an increase in fatal car accidents. Furthermore, there is a higher risk of falls at night as the result of the groggy hangover commonly experienced by sleeping pills’ users. Moreover, studies indicate higher rates of heart disease and stroke in users of prescription sleeping pills. Lastly, the previously mentioned in-depth study of 2012 also concluded another frightening statistic. Individuals taking sleeping pills were 30 to 40 percent more likely to develop cancer within the two-and-a-half-year period. This number increased up to 60 percent for older sleeping medication such as Restoril. This study was focused on a short period of 2.5 years, so imagine the long term health effects!

A woman sitting upright in bed visibly worried and tired

The Power of Big Pharma

Generally, medication is very important for improving the health of millions of people around the world each day. Unfortunately, when it comes to improving sleep health, sleeping medication does more harm than good. There does not exist a sleeping pill with sound scientific data demonstrating that the benefits of this medication outweigh any potential health risks. This raises the question whether drug companies should be more transparent about the new evidence on the risks surrounding sleeping pill use.

The problem is that Big Pharma is notoriously inflexible when it comes to the arena of revised medical indications. Especially once a drug has already been approved following basic safety assessments. The most important factor at play here is money. These large companies make billions of revenues each year by the sale of sleeping pills. For example, Ambien makes a staggering 2 billion dollars in revenue each year. Consequently, Big Pharma has a lot of power and influence on the decision making at all levels. This allows them to sell their sleeping pills to millions of ignorant consumers, despite the numerous health risks.

Don’t be fooled by the false promises and unrealistic claims made by the pharmaceutical companies. Sleeping medication is a killer and lowers your quality of life substantially and in numerous ways. Therefore, if you value your health and life, stay away from sleeping medication! There are many other, more effective and cheaper methods to improve you sleep quality and to reduce insomnia at night. More information on how to improve your sleep health and reduce insomnia can be found on the pages focused on Sleeping Tips For Individuals and Treatments of Insomnia.