Blue Light and Sleep From a Nurse's Perspective
January 23, 2016I hope you have all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year! 2016 is here and it’s all happening….I cannot tell you how much I have loved my blue light blocker glasses! More and more research is revealing the damaging effects that excessive blue light can have on us. People cannot ignore this or say it’s just coming from the “woowoo people”. There are some very important things we need to know:
Of all the colours in the light spectrum, blue light is one of the most damaging simply because we overdose on it with all of our technology…all day and often much of the night for many of us.
You have heard me speak on this before. How we need to block the blue light at night to allow melatonin levels to rise. My concern is that we are not waking up to this fact fast enough. Working in an intensive care unit is as bright as bright can be. We often do not have the lights dimmed down too much at night. I worry for our poor patients….who get sleep deprived and starved of natural sunlight. If I had the money and power (dreams are free!) I would make hospitals one level only with retractable roofs. Then, every day, when it is not raining, I would open those roofs for at least 15 minutes to give patients and staff access to natural normal sunlight. And it might sound crazy, but I think they would heal better, faster and be FAR better off emotionally.
But what do we do? We put people in hospitals where they often cannot go outside (unless it’s for a smoke!). And we expose them to a truckload of artificial light…blue light overdose. And we give them “sleeping tablets” to allow them to get some rest. This stuffs up their entire circadian rhythm ofcourse…then we make a whole lot of noise during the night so the poor buggers can’t sleep anyway…and when the morning staff come on duty they wonder why their patients are so tired??? Honestly, the best place for any of you to get well is IN YOUR OWN HOME. Get those blue light blocker glasses for any of your loved ones who are in hospital. If you can, get them outside when you visit them. Even just for 5 minutes. They need REAL light. Sunlight….without sunscreen and sunglasses. They need those rays on their skin and in their eyes, hitting the back of their retinas. Trust me on this. You want to feel better? Do this…and guess what? It doesn’t cost anything! Big pharma can’t patent the sun can they????
We live in a caged world built around four walls for home, work and play. Get outside people. Don’t be afraid of the sun. You have been fooled. When you are inside, use some form of blue blocking device to limit your exposure. Simple….I love you all. May the force be with you! Stay well!
Kerrie (Nurse Extraordinaire) ☺☺☺