Sleep Aids Tied to Early Death

By Vanessa Evans | Yahoo! Contributor Network

A study published in the British medical journal BMJ has discovered that taking a sleeping pill might increase your risk of early death significantly, according to U.S. News. A link was found between people who took sleeping pills and what researchers labeled "excess deaths" throughout the country.

How do sleeping pills cause early death?

Researchers were unable to determine exactly how the pills affect a person this way, although they did find what appears to be a preliminary link between sleep aids and an increased risk of developing cancer, according to WebMD. Among those they studied, people who took sleeping pills had a 35 percent increase in their rate of cancer development.

There were other risks as well that researchers labeled "associated factors." These included depression, anxiety, sleep apnea, mixed drug overdoses and several others.

How was the study conducted?

Scientists working through the Geisinger Health System in Pennsylvania studied 10,000 patients who took sleeping pills for at least 2 1/2 years, according to MSNBC. They built controls into the study to account for individual health, age, weight, preexisting conditions and a host of other factors so as to be able to evaluate everyone who participated on an equal basis.

What has been the response to the study?

The maker of Ambien, Sanofi-Aventis, were quick to defend its product. Sanofi said the product is safe but should always be prescribed according to packaging directions and taken as directed. The company also questioned the validity of the study, saying it had limitations and was therefore inaccurate, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Other critics, including Nancy Snyderman, who is the chief medical editor at NBC, pointed out the study was based on prescriptions. That doesn't mean the person who was prescribed the sleep aid actually took it. She also pointed out the relationship between sleep aids and an increased risk of death appears to be associative, not cause-and-effect.

What will researchers be looking at next?

Daniel F. Kripke, who co-authored the study, wants to expand it. He intends to look into the factors involved in taking sleep aids and the link to major health issues to try to figure out how sleep aids can influence a person's overall health.

What have the authors of the study said about the results?

Robert D. Langer, one of the co-authors of the study, said in a statement quoted by CBS News that the team was "shocked" when it discovered the correlation between the drugs and major health issues. He recommended trying to find alternate methods of treating sleep issues and to use sleep aids sparingly.

Vanessa Evans is a musician and freelance writer based in Michigan, with a lifelong interest in health and nutrition issues.

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Study: Popular Sleeping Pill Ambien Linked to Increased Death Rate

By Jason Koebler | U.S.News & World Report LP 

A new study has linked popular sleeping pills such as Ambien and Restoril with a nearly five-fold increased risk of death.

Researchers at Scripps Health, a nonprofit health system in San Diego, estimate that in 2010, sleeping pill use may have contributed to up to 500,000 "excess deaths" in the United States. Heavy users aren't the only ones at risk--even people who took fewer than two pills monthly are three times more likely to die than non-users, researchers say.

"We were pretty startled by the findings," says Robert Langer, one of the authors of the study, which was published in BMJ, a British medical journal owned by the British Medical Association. "Since we started trying to qualify the results of this analysis about a year ago, I'll tell you, my prescription bottle for Ambien has sat on the shelf unopened."

[See pictures of Notable Deaths of 2011]

The study followed 10,000 sleeping pill users and 23,500 non-users in Pennsylvania between 2002 and 2006. About 1 percent of non-users died during that time, compared to 6 percent of sleeping pill users. Since the medical records available for the study didn't include the cause of death, it's unclear how sleeping pill use contributed to the higher death rate.

Langer says the team's algorithm considered both users' and non-users' age, race, body mass index, and reported alcohol and tobacco use to determine if any other conditions were contributing to the mortality rates. The team also examined death rates in users and non-users who had a secondary condition, such as diabetes, hypertension, obesity, or asthma. No matter how the team sliced it, sleeping pill users had higher death rates.

"We thought maybe sleeping pills are being prescribed for sicker people, so we tried to take that out of the mix in several different ways," Langer says. "The risk was the same whichever way we looked at it. To me, that was the most startling finding. It blows things like high cholesterol or diabetes out of the water."

Sleeping pills are among the most widely prescribed medications in the United States--it's been estimated that as much as 10 percent of American adults use them at least occasionally. Some studies link sleeping pill use with higher cancer rates. Langer's team found that heavy users had about a 35 percent higher risk of developing a major cancer during the study, but that pales in comparison to the 450 percent increased mortality rate, Langer says.

[See the U.S. News Best Hospital Rankings]

Representatives from Sanofi, who makes Ambien, say the Scripps study is flawed.

"Sanofi believes the limitations of the analysis go further than what the authors indicate in the article and that the conclusions drawn based on the data presented are highly questionable," the company said in a statement. "Ambien has more than 17 years of real-world experience and is safe and effective when prescribed and taken according to its labeling."

Jack Cox, a spokesman for the company, added that trouble sleeping is often a symptom of other disorders. "People taking the medicine should discuss what's causing them not to sleep and address those issues," he says.

The Scripps team is exploring potential follow up studies that would examine causes of death. "We're starting to contact places about other populations we might look at," Langer says. "It's important to try and understand what the causes of death are."

The team is exploring potential follow up studies that would examine causes of death. "We're starting to contact places about other populations we might look at," he says. "It's important to try and understand what the causes of death are."

Langer says sleeping pill users can wake up in a "hangover" state, where they are at a higher risk for falls or car accidents. Overdose and drug interaction-related deaths were also likely, Langer says.

The short half-life of Zolpidem (Ambien) and Temazepam (Restoril) means they leave a users' body within a couple hours, leading many to believe they are safer than longer-lasting drugs. Langer says his study shows that's not the case.

"People think these newer, shorter-acting sleeping pills are safer because they're out of your body relatively quickly," he says. "That's not true. There are meaningful risks associated with even occasional use."

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