Hi there it's Matt here and welcome back to the podcast and welcome back to

another of those new types of episodes called Hot Off the Press. As you will remember, these new types of

episodes are going to cover the very latest and greatest in sleep science, the most exciting new studies that have only

recently come out.

Today's hot off the press is all about dealing with nightmares.

Before we speak about the new study and how to address nightmares,

I think definitions are in order.

Put simply, nightmares involve very strong negative emotions

during incredibly unpleasant dreams and they most often occur from something that we call rapid eye movement sleep or REM sleep the stage most associated with dreams.

And these nightmares can take the form of things like interpersonal conflict or fear or sadness, even anger and aggression

or even experiences of humiliating failure. And please keep in mind that it is perfectly normal to experience nightmares now and then. I experience them. We can all experience them, especially as children, but also as adults.

But for nearly 4% of adults, nightmares are so prevalent, so severe, and so hurtful that they end up interrupting their ability to have a good night

of sleep on a weekly basis. And in this extreme case, they can develop what we call N

N NU. basis and in this extreme case they can develop what we call nightmare disorder

which is one of the many different sleep disorders out there.

Thankfully we currently have a number of different treatment approaches to nightmares.

One that we in fact have done some work on here at my sleep center

is specifically around dreams as a form of overnight therapy and working

with some clinical colleagues examining nightmares that are associated

with something called post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD and using a drug

called Prasasin and that is spelled PR A Z-O- N. Which in fact reminds me I should do a whole podcast on that topic of

PTSD nightmares and Prasasin, But that's not our focus today. Today we're talking about a

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