Clinics, Pills Offer Hopes of Sweet Dreams

Columbus Dispatch

5/01/06

Recently, David Kivimaki spent a Wednesday night and most of Thursday in the Sleep Disorder Center at University Hospitals East, where experts watched him during the night. Helping people get a good night’s rest is big business. The number of sleep centers in the United States has nearly tripled in the past decade, and prescriptions for sleep aids have increased by 60 percent since 2000, says IMS Health, a research tracking company. Children’s Hospital, OSU, OhioHealth and Mount Carmel all have sleep centers. There are also several private centers in central Ohio; most have weeks-long waiting lists. "We have 10 beds and typically we have a backlog of about four weeks," said Dr. Ulysses Magalang, medical director of OSU’s sleep center. "Some of our patients travel hours to get here."

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