Sonia Ancoli-Israel, PhD

Interviewed Spring 2002

Archived Profiles

Dr. Sonia Ancoli-Israel is a Professor in the Dept. of Psychiatry at the U.C. San Diego School of Medicine, Director of the Sleep Disorders Clinic at the VA San Diego Healthcare System and Co-Director of the Education Unit of the VA VISN-22 MIRECC. Dr. Ancoli-Israel received a BA from the State Univ. of New York, Stony Brook, and a Ph.D. in Psychology from U.C. San Francisco.

Dr. Ancoli-Israel is one of the nation's leading experts in the field of sleeping disorders and sleep research in aging. Among her current interests are the longitudinal effect of sleep disorders on aging, the use of light therapy to improve sleep and behavior in nursing home populations and the relationship between circadian rhythms and cancer. She is President of the Society for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms and has over 300 publications in the field. She is married and has two children.

What research is conducted at your sleep clinic?

The emphasis of my research has been on sleep in the elderly. We have shown that a sleep disorder called sleep apnea is more common in the elderly than in younger adults. Sleep apnea is a disorder during which people stop breathing during sleep which can lead to hypoxia, excessive daytime sleepiness, and cognitive impairment among other things. We have also shown the sleep apnea is even more common in patients with dementia than in cognitively intact elderly. One of our current studies is examining the effect of treating sleep apnea on cognitive functioning in patients with mild to moderate dementia. We are hopeful that if we can either improve cognitive functioning, or at least delay the decline of cognitive functioning, we might be able to postpone institutionalization.

Who might benefit from a sleep clinic?

Patients who find that their nighttime sleep problems are interfering with their ability to function during the day should seek help from their health care professionals. If that person is unsuccessful in treating the problem, then the patient should be referred to a sleep clinic. In addition, patients who are excessively sleepy during the day (which means being unable to stay awake while driving, at meetings, at times when it would be inappropriate to fall asleep) should be seen by a sleep medicine expert.

How did you become involved in sleep research?

My training was in psychophysiology - the relation between the mind and the body. Sleep is one of the areas consumed within psychophysiology. I became particularly interested in whether the symptoms often seen in patients with sleep apnea (i.e., snoring, daytime sleepiness, hypertension, cardiological problems, cognitive impairment) might have anything to do with the symptoms often associated with aging (i.e., snoring, daytime sleepiness, hypertension, cardiological problems, cognitive impairment). This led to my first research grant, funded by the National Institute on Aging. I've been doing research in sleep ever since.

You wrote a book called, “All I Want is a Good Night’s Sleep”. For what audience was the book written?

The book was written for the general public - for people with difficulty sleeping or who are sleeping too much, who want to educate themselves first before seeking help, or to educate themselves on what to expect when seeking help. I had so often heard people say that sleep is not important, or that people with insomnia are just not working hard enough during the day. I wanted to teach the public that sleep is important, and that not sleeping is a serious problem that often has a physiological, not just psychological, cause.

How is sleep research conducted?

There are many ways to study sleep from questionnaires to full sleep recordings. The "gold standard" is to record sleep by having people sleep in a sleep laboratory while having physiological systems such as brain waves, eye movement, muscle tension, respiration recorded. Some people find the wires a bit disturbing, but others have no trouble sleeping. Newer technology allows this same type of recording to be conducted in the patient's home.