This article started from a conversation with a patient. She's having trouble sleeping and has tried to get into a sleep study. Problem is, she can't get in for 4 months. Nice. So, we had a conversion about ways to sleep better now. One of the quickest ways to improve sleep is to get a new bed. I'll give you more tips at the end, as well.

So, to add to your sleeping better knowledge I sat down with a local sleep expert from IntelliBed, Kristin Moyle.

I know a lot of people who have trouble sleeping. I thought maybe we could get some more tips today on how to sleep better. We’re going to try to give you lots of ideas and ways to improve your sleep. She has a background in health. I’m going to let her talk a little bit about her story and what she can bring to the table for you today. Take it away, Kristin.

Kristin Moyle: Thanks, Dr. Altman. I have a background in health. My degree was in Health Promotion at BYU. I came to IntelliBED a couple of months ago, because I feel like the gel that’s inside the bed contributes to the fact that it’s a health and wellness product. It has been something in our own home that I’ve slept on since I’ve worked here. I can tell you that it’s helped every morning when I wake up, every night when I go to bed.

Dr. Altman: When you are at home, though--what you were telling me earlier--is that your daughter has some back problems. Can you tell me how IntelliBED helped her?

Kristin Moyle: My daughter is 17. She is a swimmer at Lone Peak High School. She likes to be active and is an athlete. She has back issues that were giving her a lot of pain. It was affecting her swimming, affecting her sleeping, and affecting her in the classroom. There was just a lot of constant pain. We bought her an IntelliBED a few months ago. After the first night, she woke up and said “My back lower back pain is gone.” She still has some issues that need to be addressed with the chiropractor. But as far as her waking up sore in the morning--that has been eliminated due to our IntelliBED. I really believe that that’s helped her night after night. She’s doing much better with her back.
 
Dr. Altman: One thing that I want to be covered--that I think you can be the expert on--is how the IntelliBED differs from an innerspring mattress or maybe a foam mattress? A lot of people sleep on foam or they sleep on an air mattress of some sort. How is that different? Maybe go through that a little bit.

Kristin Moyle: Okay, that’s a really great question. There are about four main beds that are out there. There’s the innerspring bed, which is your normal mattress that you would get at a department store, for instance. Then there is the foam bed that has the memory foam in it. There is an air mattress. We feel like we’re the other one that’s out there--IntelliBED.

The difference is that the gel was made by a group of engineers here in Utah about 17 years ago. It was meant to replace foam. The memory foam that’s in popular beds, they spray that with chemicals and fire retardants and things like that, in order to make it a memory foam. It’s not intended to be slept on, as far as the chemicals go. There’s a lot of off-gassing that can occur with those types of beds.

(Dr. Altman interruption here, If you want to read up further on off-gassing, this is a good article, It references the flame retardants as specific toxicities. If you remember, we talked about this briefly in my toxicity article, here. National Geographic paid $15,000 for a journalist to get chemicals tested, the flame retardants were very high.)

The rest of the interview, show notes, and bonus sleep tips are here.