Women who use sleep aids are at greater risk than men

You know a drug has crossed over from bestseller to blockbuster when it becomes a punchline on late night talk shows.

Ambien is the latest crossover. That’s partly because some people use this sleep-aid as a recreational drug.

But ANY way you use it, it’s dangerous. Especially for women. In fact, the FDA now requires a new warning for sleep-aids that contain the ingredient zolpidem. That includes Ambien, Intermezzo, Zolpimist, and others.

Zolpidem lingers in the system of some women. So they start their morning still under the influence of last night’s sleeping pill. That creates a significant driving hazard.

So the new FDA action calls for recommended doses of zolpidem drugs to be cut in half for women.

Many women will feel safer with the new dosage. But they shouldn’t. Because impaired driving is just one of the dangers linked to hypnotic sleep-aids.

Last year, I told you about a disturbing new sleep-aid study. I mentioned this study in passing recently. But this seems like a perfect moment to take a closer look at the frightening conclusion.

For two and a half years, researchers tracked about 10,500 subjects who took a wide range of hypnotic sleep-aids. In addition to Ambien and Lunesta, these drugs included barbiturates and sedative antihistamines.

Researchers matched all of those subjects with a group of more than 23,600 subjects who didn’t use sleep-aids.

Subjects who took one of the sleep drugs between 18 and 132 times each year were FOUR TIMES more likely to die of any cause. And subjects who took just 18 or fewer doses per year were more than 3.5 times more likely to die.

A risk that high from such modest use is just stunning!

And then there’s cancer. As if all these elevated risks of premature mortality weren’t enough, the study also showed a significantly higher risk of a variety of cancers in hypnotic drug users — especially in those who consistently took these drugs week after week.

Half a dose of these drugs is better than a full dose. But for many, that will still be a half dose too high.

Sources:
“FDA to require lower recommended dosages for sleep drugs” Brady Dennis, The Washington Post, 1/10/13, washingtonpost.com

“Hypnotics’ association with mortality or cancer: a matched cohort study” BMJ Open, Vol. 2, No. 1, February 2012, bmjopen.bmj.com

“Common sleeping pills linked to more than fourfold increased risk of death” BMJ-British Medical Journal press release, 2/27/12, eurekalert.org