Australian Makers - Sleep Corp®

Can you imagine a world where we all wake up rested, safe in the sanctuary of the bedroom, ready to take on the day with a clear head and that fresh feeling that only comes from a perfect night of sleep? Here at Sleep Corp®, we can. 

Over 40 years ago, David Kaplan, Sleep Corp’s Founder and Managing Director, first saw the need for Mattress Protection when his niece wet the bed. This led David and his brother-in-law, Murray McLeod, to invent the world’s first waterproof mattress protector and create a new category worldwide.  

Sleep Corp’s flagship brand Protect-A-Bed® provides a healthy sleep zone solution by protecting mattresses from spills and stains and the sleeper from dust mites, mould and bacteria allergens - common causes and triggers of allergies, asthma and eczema. Quality and efficacy are backed by a market-leading warranty. If you buy a Protect-A-Bed® Mattress Protector at the same time as your new mattress, and it stains, Sleep Corp® will clean or replace it.

Proudly Australian-owned and operated, Sleep Corp® is guided by our vision of “Supporting people to deal with life’s challenges by unlocking the power of sleep”. As we look forward, we continue to develop new ranges of market-leading Mattress and Pillow protection products and are rapidly expanding into other bedding products in Australia and around the world. 

Having recently embarked on the industry 4.0 journey, Sleep Corp® has proudly invested in a new state-of-the-art head office and manufacturing facility in Melbourne, supporting Australian jobs and manufacturing whilst ensuring exceptional quality. As a result, sleep Corp® is set up for a strong future while we continue to help our customers sleep well and live well.

All aboard sleepbus®

 

Without deep restorative sleep our circulation, immune system, metabolism, and our brain function are all compromised. At the most basic level, think about how awful you feel the next day after a restless night’s sleep or how a new parent feels like a zombie after sleepless nights with a newborn. Can you imagine how crappy you feel after sleeping poorly for days, weeks, or even months and trying to get your life back in order.

Well one man did, Simon Rowe, he gave up his corporate job intending to find a way to help the more than 8000 people in Australia who sleep rough each night, get a safe comfortable sleep. 

“Without a good night’s sleep, things can spiral out of control pretty quickly” said Simon, “Access to a safe, comfortable place to sleep means better mental and physical health and ultimately, a chance to take a breath to work on a pathway out of homelessness”

As a young man Simon had been in this situation himself, so with the mission ‘To bring safe, temporary overnight accommodation to people sleeping rough in Australia’ he set about finding a cost-effective solution to the shortage of beds for our society’s most vulnerable. The answer came in sleepbus.

The sleepbus® concept was tested with a GoFundMe event raising enough money for its first bus in four days. Now with four buses across Australia including a pink bus for homeless women and children and 4 more buses in the pipeline, Simon and his team are making sleep a priority for those that are vulnerable.

Each sleepbus provides 20 secure, climate-controlled individual sleep pods, with a lockable door, toilet, and even room for pets. The sleep pods are equipped with a television and a local community channel with links to support services providing assistance with finances, employment, education, healthcare and legal advice.

“With the mantra ‘Sleep changes everything’, sleepbus is very much aligned to our philosophy” said Paul Blewett, COO at Sleep Corp. “We are very proud to be able to assist with healthy, hygienic bedding ensuring a healthy night’s sleep.”

“We are passionate about unlocking the power of sleep and its impact on dealing with life’s challenges: said Blewett, “This coming year our team at SleepCorp is committed to fundraising events for sleepbus.org and encourage other organisations to do what they can to help”

If you want to get involved or simply donate to the cause, contact Simon and the sleepbus® team at www.sleepbus.org/contact.

Infant Sleep Safety

Unlike adults and older children, infants are vulnerable to sleep related injury due to a variety of circumstances such as their sleeping environments and the way they are sleeping. It’s therefore important for parents to take the correct measures to make sure your child is sleeping in the safest way possible. 

Always place a baby on their back to sleep.

This keeps your baby's airways clear, reducing the risk of suffocation, overheating and choking.

Keep your baby’s face and head uncovered.

Bubs control their temperature through their face and head, so keeping their face and head uncovered reduces the risk of overheating. It also keeps their airways clear which reduces the risk of suffocation.

Tuck blankets in firmly or use a safe baby sleeping bag - If a blanket is being used instead of a sleeping bag, ensure your baby is placed with their feet at the end of the cot, tucking the blanket in securely underneath the mattress, so it can only ride up as far as baby’s chest and cannot cover their head.

Bed Sharing

Bubs should always sleep alone and on their own sleep surface, it can be in the same room as you and this is actually preferable, but always in their own cot.

Safe Sleeping Environment

Safe Cot

Use a cot that meets the current Australian and New Zealand Standard AS/NZS 2172. If buying a second-hand cot try and get one that is less than 10 years old that will also meet the current standards. Cots that don’t meet these standards can have health risks such as large gaps or sides that are too low.

Safe Mattress

Ensure the mattress is firm and flat. Soft or inclined surfaces can result in blocking airways.

Ensure the mattress is the right size, a baby can get stuck in gaps between a poorly fitted mattress and the cot sides. You want the gap between the mattress and cot to be no smaller than 20mm.

Safe Bedding

Remove Soft bedding such as pillows, quilts, doonas, soft toys and bumpers from your baby’s cot as these can cover the baby’s face and obstruct breathing as well cause overheating.

Make sure if using a mattress protector that they are thin and fitted to the mattress tightly and no bunching is able to occur.

Visibility

Anything that makes it harder to see the baby while sleeping such as curtains, mobiles, high box sides should be avoided.

Three Key Elements to a Good Night's Sleep

You probably ask yourself all the time what makes a good night’s sleep? If you google it, you’ll most likely see lists upon lists of top ten tips or the 5 best secrets to a good night’s sleep. Whilst these lists probably have great ideas, they may be redundant without understanding the key elements that make a good night’s sleep.

We’ve narrowed it down to three key elements for a good night’s sleep:

1. Duration
2. Continuity
3. Depth

Now you know the three elements let’s expand on what they are so you have a basic understanding and can apply those great tips you see everywhere including our Instagram 😉.

1. Duration

Duration refers to the length of time that you sleep for, your sleep needs to be long enough that when you wake up the next day you are feeling refreshed and alert. Generally speaking, for an adult this is between 7-9 hours of sleep, with the length being longer for teenagers and young children.

 

Life Stage	Required Sleep
Older Adults	7-8 hours
Young Adults	7-9 hours
Teenagers	8-10 hours
School-aged children	9-11 hours
Preschoolers	10-13 hours
Toddlers	11-14 hours
Infants	12-15 hours
Newborns	14-17 hours

 

2. Continuity

Your sleep needs to be long and uninterrupted, even if you are still getting your required hours of sleep a night if you are waking up multiple times this can affect the overall quality of your sleep. There are four stages of sleep that humans go through each night:

1. Stage 1 – A light sleep that only lasts a few minutes and is a transition period between wakefulness and sleep. Our body and brain start slowing down.
2. Stage 2 – Occurs when the body starts transitioning from a light sleep to a deeper sleep. Our bodily functions continue to slow down, muscles relax, eye movement stops and our body temperature reduces. On top of this brain waves slow down further.
3. Deep Sleep – Our heart rate and breathing rate are at their lowest during this part of the sleep cycle. The muscles and eyes are also very relaxed, and the brain waves become even slower.
4. REM (Rapid Eye Movement) Sleep – Occurs roughly 90 minutes after falling asleep, this is closer to a state of wakefulness with our breathing and heart rate increasing as well as our eyes start to move rapidly side to side behind our eyelids, this is when most of our dreams occur.

As you can see our body slides through different and important stages of sleep each night and can do this multiple times, so if you are repeatedly waking up during the night you are disrupting your bodies sleep cycle.

3. Depth

This ties in with the stages of sleep we touched on above when talking about sleep continuity, you want your sleep to be deep and restorative. This means we especially want to make sure we are reaching the third and fourth stage of sleep known as slow wave sleep.  Slow wave sleep is attributed to play a pivotal role in brain restoration and recovery as well as memory consolidation, whilst also producing human growth hormone which repairs tissues and cells in our bodies. All very important for us to be functional humans the next day.

Now you are equipped with the understanding of the key factors making up a good night’s sleep, you can now start creating a sleep routine that will aid you in sleeping the required amount and protecting it from interruption.

Why Do We Dream?

We all dream every night. 

Dreams are a normal part of sleep. Most dreams occur and are the most vivid when we are in REM sleep.  REM sleep generally first happens about 90 minutes after falling asleep and each REM stage can last up to an hour.  The average adult having five to six REM cycles each night.

Dreams don’t often make sense and are not commonly remembered when we wake up

During the day when awake our thoughts, ideas and actions are based on logic.  When we are asleep and dreaming the logical region of our brain shuts down and our dreams are driven by the emotional side of our brain, with about two thirds of our dreams occurring in pictures.

“During REM sleep many of our muscles relax completely and this prevents us acting out our dreams. If this system doesn’t work properly, we may try to act out our dreams, especially if the dreams involve strong emotions.” – Sleep Health Foundation

Dreams are often linked to things that have happened in our daily lives

If you are in a positive mind set and have a good day, you are more likely to have a good dream.  If you are depressed or anxious this may compromise your sleep quality and contribute to bad dreams.

Nightmares

Nightmares are vivid scary dreams. They tend to wake you up. They may often also stop you going back to sleep.

For children they are often thought of as part of growing up but they can also be set off by things such as a stressful event in life, trauma, medications, substance abuse or a mental or physical illness.

According to the Sleep Health Foundation of Australia

“10% to 50% of children have them. The number of adults who have nightmares is much less, from 2.5% to 10%”

If you are experiencing vivid scary dreams or nightmares regularly you may not be getting enough sleep at night or wake up feeling tired and stressed.  If this is occurring regularly counselling may help.

The role of dreams is not clear, but there are some widely held theories

Commonly it is thought that dreaming allows us to analyse and consolidate memories, skills and habits. Assisting us in our ability to respond to situations in our daily lives.  

Other beliefs include dream’s acting as a creative muse, inspiring and facilitating our creativity.   As a therapist, helping connect our feelings in such a way that we would not while awake.  Or as a way of helping us deal with a threat or problem.

“One of the areas of the brain that’s most active during dreaming is the amygdala. The amygdala is the part of the brain associated with the survival instinct and the fight-or-flight response.”  healthline.com

Dreams are a normal part of sleep

Although there is still a lot to be learnt about their cause and function, they are part of our regular sleep cycle which is vitally important for our everyday health and well being.

Sleep Well, Live Well

 

Sleep Debt

Many things can interfere with us getting enough sleep.  A late night movie, completing a work assignment or a night out with friends.

For an adult the recommended amount of sleep for our bodies to function effectively is 7-9 hours a night.  Sleep debt is where there is a difference in the amount of sleep we should be getting versus the amount of sleep we are actually getting.

Short term sleep debt can result in a lack of concentration, irritability and poor judgement, affecting our ability to learn and complete tasks, and increasing the likelihood of accidents or errors to occur.

As sleep is restorative, longer term a chronic lack of sleep can contribute to health problems including obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and a weakened immune system.  You may also be more susceptible to experiencing anxiety and depression.

Naps

If you have had a late night or are feeling tired a nap may help during the day, reducing fatigue, increasing alertness, improving your mood, performance and reaction time. A nap may also help you prepare for and be able to better cope with a late night out, shift work or a long drive.

Ideally a nap should only be 15-30 minutes long.  This will ensure that when you wake you are still in the lightest stage of non-REM sleep.   Any longer, where you enter the deeper stages of sleep you risk waking up with what is known as sleep inertia.  Feeling groggy and perhaps more tired and with less energy than before your nap.

Sleeping in

Many of us enjoy a weekend sleep in, catching up on sleep lost during the week. Whilst it may seem a good idea and make you feel less tired, if you are sleeping in do not sleep for more than 2 hours longer than normal.   Sleeping late into the morning can further disrupt your sleep patterns by making you feel less sleepy when you should be going to bed at night.    

How to avoid sleep debt

Sleeping in or taking naps may make us feel less tired in the short term but they are not a solution for long term chronic sleep debt and the potential long-term effects on your health.

Avoiding sleep debt, and providing your body with the sleep it needs requires a regular sleep routine and good sleep hygiene habits.

1. Keep to a regular routine. Go to bed and get up at the same time each day, ensuring you are getting the recommended 7-9 hours of sleep a day needed.
2. Wind down before bedtime by reading a book or listening to soothing music.
3. Resist the urge to check work emails and social media and switch of all screens including the TV at least an hour before bedtime.
4. Avoid caffeine and alcohol in the evenings.
5. Have a good sleep environment, dark, quiet and cool (between 16°C and 18°C).

It may take time to get into a routine but by following good sleep hygiene and a regular sleep routine you will regain the energy you have been lacking and it will benefit your long term health and wellbeing.

Sleep Well, Live Well

Food for a good night's sleep

We all know that exercise, healthy eating and a good night’s sleep are key to our wellbeing, but did you know that what we eat can affect the quality of our sleep and how we have slept can affect what we want to eat.

How our Diet and Sleep are related.

Not getting enough sleep and feeling tired can make us more hungry

Yes, it is true.  When tired we often want to eat more and often find ourselves reaching for energy rich but nutrient poor foods.   A lack of sleep increases the release of the hormone Ghrelin which makes us feel hungry, whilst suppressing the release of the hormone Leptin that makes us feel full.  Long term lack of sleep or tiredness is therefore linked to an increase in weight, which also increases the risk of snoring.

And what we eat and drink during the day can affect our ability to fall asleep

Our food and drink is made up of various nutrients which may influence our sleep patterns.

Eating certain foods can help you get in the mood for sleep whilst other can make you feel alert or wake you during the night.  

Foods to eat, for a better night’s sleep

Foods that contain Melatonin

Melatonin helps your body know when to wake up and go to sleep, with Melatonin levels generally starting to go up about 2 hours before sleep. 

Foods high in Melatonin include:

• Nuts and seeds including almonds, walnuts, peanuts, sunflower seeds and flaxseeds.
• Fruits and vegetables including banana’s, grapes, cherry’s asparagus and broccoli.
• Grains or oats

Foods that contain Tryptophan

Tryptophan is an essential amino acid found in many foods which plays a role in creating Serotonin.  Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that effects our mood and helps to regulate sleep and is converted into the sleep hormone melatonin.

Foods that contain Tryptophan include:

• Dairy products including eggs, milk, low-fat yogurt and cheese
• Nuts and seeds
• Seafood
• Poultry
• Vegetables such as spinach, broccoli and asparagus.
• Fruit including kiwifruit, apples, bananas and avocado
• Beans
• Grains or oats

Many of these are protein rich foods, which on their own may not be enough.  High protein meals can actually result in a drop of Serotonin because they contain not only Tryptophan but a number of other amino acids all of which are competing to make their way into the brain.

Eating a light carbohydrate can assist.  Carbohydrates trigger the release of insulin which causes amino acids, but not Tryptophan to be absorbed into the body.  Tryptophan remains in the bloodstream at high levels and can then enter the brain and cause Serotonin levels to rise. 

Foods that contain Calcium

Dairy products that contain both Tryptophan and Calcium are also good sleep inducers

"Calcium helps the brain use the amino acid tryptophan to manufacture the sleep-inducing substance melatonin. This explains why dairy products, which contain both tryptophan and calcium, are one of the top sleep-inducing foods." – Medical News Today

Some good sources of Calcium which include Tryptophan are: 

• Some greens including broccoli
• Dairy products
• Nuts including almonds
• Beans

Foods that contain Vitamin B6

B6 also aids in the production of Serotonin and Melatonin. Deficiencies in the Vitamin B6 have been linked with lowered Serotonin levels, poor-quality sleep, insomnia and depression.

Vitamin B6 can be found in

• Nuts and seeds including sunflower seeds, pistachio nuts and flaxseed
• Fish including tuna and salmon
• Meats including chicken, lean beef and lean pork
• Some fruits including banana’s and avocado

Foods that contain Magnesium

A lack of magnesium has been linked to increased stress and anxiety levels and difficulty going and staying asleep.

Magnesium can be found in:

• Nuts and Seeds
• Fish
• Some dark leafy greens including spinach and kale
• Some fruit including bananas and avocado’s

You may also consider a drink of Chamomile Tea

Chamomile tea is a well-known remedy for a good night’s sleep, helping calm the brain and body Chamomile Tea is rich in an antioxidant called apigenin.

And adding a teaspoon of raw honey Honey,  restocks the liver with Glycogen which our brain users for energy.  If glycogen is low the brain can wake us up telling us we need to eat. The natural sugars in honey also slightly raise insulin levels which help Tryptophan to enter the brain.  

Milk

Many of us grew up with our parents telling us a warm glass of milk would help us sleep.  Just this association may help you relax and prepare for a good night’s sleep.   But there is also scientific evidence of the benefits of milk before bed.  Milk is a natural source of the sleep inducing Tryptophan amino acid.

Food and drink to avoid, if you want a better night’s sleep

Caffeine

A naturally occurring stimulant, caffeine can be found in many food and drinks including coffee, tea and chocolate. While caffeine may give us a much needed wake-up or boost during the day, it can also affect our sleep and contribute to us feeling more tired the following day.

If you are drinking or consuming large amounts of caffeine consider cutting back.  Just don’t stop suddenly, gradually cut back. If your body is used to caffeine as stimulant, simply stopping may give you headaches.

Try having that last one at different times to see what works best for you because as recognised by the Sleep Health Foundation

 “There are different views on how many hours before bed you should have your last caffeine intake. Some say caffeine should be avoided for at least 3 to 7 hours before going to sleep. Others say no caffeine after lunch time if you have sleep problems. Many people find that their sleep improves with less caffeine or only having caffeine earlier in the day.”

Alcohol

Although Alcohol can make you feel tired and help you fall asleep faster it is disruptive to the amount and quality of your sleep.  It may stop you from entering into the deeper and restorative stages of sleep and it is associated with one waking up more regularly in the night.  It is best to avoid alcohol for at least 4 hours before bedtime.

Spicy Foods

Spicy foods are known to cause heartburn, indigestion and acid reflux, which may be made worse by lying down.   The Sleep Council UK also recognize that research has found that spicy foods

“brought about a change in body temperature which can confuse the brain, as core temperature naturally dips as bedtime approaches.”

Foods High in fat

Fatty foods have been linked to poor fragmented sleep patterns and can also trigger acid production in the stomach leading to heartburn and indigestion.

Foods that have a high water content and are natural diuretics.

Natural diuretics elevate the rate and need for urination and you don’t want to be woken in the night needing to go to the bathroom.  Foods that are natural diuretics include watermelon, celery and cucumber.

Large or protein heavy meals before bedtime

Avoid eating a large meal, or a meal heavy in protein, too close to bedtime and allow at least 2-3 hours between your last main meal of the day and bedtime. A small snack is ok.  Going to bed with a full tummy will cause your body to focus on digesting rather than sleeping. 

Remember that along with regular exercise a healthy balanced diet will help improve your sleep and energy levels.

Note: The lists above are not exhaustive and if regularly having trouble sleeping you should consult your doctor.

Sleep Well, Live Well