A sleep diary is a record of your sleeping, including all of the aspects of your sleep. This includes data about your sleep, patterns of sleep, and sleep habits in order to identify potential problems that should require a sleep study. Sleep diaries are generally kept over a period of at least two weeks, but the longer the better.
Sleep diaries might be requested of you by your doctor or a sleep center in order to get more accurate data about your sleep habits.
Usually, the following items are kept in a sleep diary:
If you are trying to identify other specific things, then you should include those in the sleep diary as well. Ideally, you will only need to spend about 5 minutes every day filling out your diary. It may be best to do it right when you wake up so you don't forget your sleep habits throughout the day.
The main reason to keep a sleep diary is to identify all factors about your sleep, usually in order to:
Sleep diaries are easy to keep, so long as you are diligent.
Sleep diaries are easy to keep, here are some tips:
That’s it! Keeping a sleep diary is easy and a way to monitor your own sleep. This can be the first step before spending the money or time for a sleep study.
Some things to pay attention to in your sleep diary are:
In the activity of analyzing your sleep diary, what you are looking for are patterns. A sleep specialist or doctor can assist you in doing this – contact us for more details.