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Comment You can't deduce causality from longitudinal study (Score 1) 237

After reading the full study report, the headline for this post is more than a bit sensational (disappointing for /.). This was a longitudinal study comparing a set of data from a certain time period and can't be used to determine causality. Also, the control were only matched on a few data points, making this difficult to apply to a general population or even interpret if there was an actually difference in mortality given that table 3 showing differences in co-morbid diagnoses shows large disparity in key areas like cardiovascular risks, hypertension, heart failure. This point underlies why this study is not helpful. Many serious medical illnesses have insomnia has a symptom, and often treated with a sedative hypnotic. This DOES NOT mean that the sedative hypnotics are "killing" people. I hate studies like this.

Comment This is very possible in complex NREM parasomnias (Score 1) 130

I am a sleep physician and highly complex behaviors are commonly seen in NREM parasomnias (i.e. sleep walking). The idea in the article about "doctors are mystified" and "don't know what sleep stage this is occuring" seems highly suspect. With common place polysomnogram testing, sleep staging can be easily captured. I do believe that he may be having complex NREM parasomnias, but highly doubt that this is any sort of medical mystery, and does lend some credence that this is a "gimmick" for this artist.

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