Hi, I'm Meris, and in this video, I'm going to be talking to you about sleep basics,
sleep disorders, and General Adaptation Syndrome. I'm going to be following along with our
Fundamentals of Nursing flash cards. These are available on our website, leveluprn.com. If you
already have a set for yourself, you can follow along. I'm starting on card 62. Let's get started.
Okay, so starting off, we're going to talk about the circadian rhythm. So you'll hear this thrown
around a lot in nursing school. The circadian rhythm is the natural wake and sleep cycle of
the human body. So this what regulates why we wake up in the morning and why we go to sleep at night.
So this is affected by light exposure, your environment, your age, and things like illnesses
or disease processes. So moving onto the stages of sleep. You'll see here, we have stage one through
three. I would encourage you to look at these more in depth, but the ones that I really want
to compare are going to be stage three and REM sleep. One through three are kind of just going
from light to deeper sleep. But when you get to stage three, you're in very deep sleep,
and the vital signs of your patient are at their lowest. So lowest vital signs in stage three,
compared to when we are in REM sleep. That stands for rapid eye movement. This is going to be about
90 minutes after you fall asleep, you're going to be in REM sleep, and this is where you're
going to actually see the eyes moving rapidly, rapid eye movement. But the thing to note here
is that vital signs are going to increase. This is also the phase of sleep where vivid dreaming
occurs. So we're going to have difficultly to wake in stage three and in REM sleep, but vital signs
will go up in REM sleep versus going down in stage three. Also very vivid dreaming in REM sleep.
Okay, so moving onto sleep disorders. Now, let me tell you, as someone who struggles with a sleep
disorder and has since I was six years old, it really, really impacts your patient's life, and it
impacts their ability to recover from illnesses, and it impacts their ability to deal with pain
and symptoms. So three big sleep disorders on here, and I would know them all. Insomnia,
sleep apnea, and narcolepsy. So I am a lifelong insomniac. I have difficulty falling asleep,
but some insomniacs can fall asleep okay, have difficulty staying asleep, or both. Narcolepsy,
on the other hand, is going to be your patient with excessive daytime sleepiness, and they may be
inadvertently falling asleep while they are awake. Now, sleep apnea, this is going to be a
patient who stops breathing for a period of time during their sleep, and they may have kind of an
irregular breathing pattern during sleep. So that is a very common one, and you'll see people using
different devices to help them treat their sleep apnea, such as CPAP - continuous positive airway
pressure - to help keep that airway open. Now, here's my least favorite thing because I am very,
very bad at following this advice. Sleep hygiene. So this very important patient teaching for you to
tell your patients how to get better sleep. So in this instance, I'm going to say, "Do as I say,
not as I do," because I have terrible sleep hygiene. So the first is you want to follow
a regular sleep schedule. Very important to maintain that regularity. Routine is important.
You want to sleep in a cool, dark, and quiet environment. So cool temperature,
very little light, very little noise, best for sleep. The other thing on here you're going to
see is avoid naps in the afternoon. So when you're looking at those test questions, ask yourself,
"Is this an early morning nap, or is this an afternoon nap?" Afternoon nap is going to delay
my sleepiness in the future. I'm going to avoid alcohol and caffeine later in the day. For me,
personally, I do have to avoid caffeine starting at about noon, or else I will be up all night.
And then, exercise regularly, but there's a very important point on here. We don't exercise within
three hours of bedtime. So exercise will help me sleep better, but not if it is within three
hours of my bedtime. Okay, very important there. There's a few more, be sure to look them over.
Okay, now, we're going to talk about General Adaptation Syndrome,
GAS. So this is the physiological changes that happen during periods of stress, like,
I don't know, maybe nursing school. So the alarm reaction is going to happen first. Alarm first,
right? Sound the alarm. This is going to be your fight or flight response, right? This is going
to be my heart rate. My blood pressure is going to go up. My cortisol levels are going to go up.
This is where I'm going to feel really panicked, and frenzied, and stressed, right? After that,
I'm going to have the resistance phase. My body is going to get used to it. I'm going to be able to
function again, right? My vital signs are going to normalize. My hormone levels might normalize
some. But I may have some poor concentration, irritability, and frustration. I know we have
all been there in nursing school. So I completely get it, and I feel like you completely get it too.
And then lastly, we have the exhaustion phase. Eventually, my body can't keep up anymore,
right? Eventually, it's going to say, "I can't do this anymore," and we are going to
tire out. And this is where we're going to have fatigue, and depression, anxiety,
maybe even disease because we might have impaired immunity from that prolonged stress. So very
important that you educate your patients on this, and how to mitigate their stress levels. How to
bring down their stress levels so that they don't end up affecting themselves in that way. Okay,
so that is it for basic sleep disorders and General Adaptation Syndrome. If that was a
helpful review for you, please like this video, and I would love it if you leave a comment below,
letting me know how you remember things or tell me about your experience when you have had nursing
school stress. Did you reach the exhaustion phase? Or did you find a way to deal with your stress?
Okay, be sure to subscribe to the channel too because in my next video, we are going to
be covering some really important stuff, like types of comfort care, the difference between
hospice and palliative care. We're also going to talk about the stages and types of grief.
So be sure to subscribe so that you're the first to know. Thanks so much and happy studying.
[BLOOPERS] [MERIS DANCING]
Okay, all right. I can dig it. I'm very cool and hip with the kids, as you can tell.
I invite you to subscribe to our channel and share a link with your classmates and
friends in nursing school. If you found value in this video, be sure and hit the like button,
and leave a comment and let us know what you found particularly helpful.