Naps boost productivity, experts say

Topeka Capital-Journal, The, Sep 9, 2001 by Peter Sinton Capital-Journal

Power nappers

John F. Kennedy, Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Johannes Brahms, Napoleon Bonaparte, Leonardo da Vinci and a long list of other historic figures reportedly loved to catnap, said Mark Rosekind, president of Alertness Solutions.

"Too often napping is identified with people who are lazy, stupid or don't have the right stuff. It's a real shame."

MARK ROSEKIND

Alertness Solutions

By Peter Sinton

San Francisco Chronicle

Al Kirschbaum has been napping on the job for 30 years. For up to half an hour after lunch, he puts a sign on the door of his office, loosens his tie, stretches out on the floor and snoozes.

"It's incredibly refreshing," said Kirschbaum, 63, a managing director of highly rated Fremont Investment Advisors in San Francisco, which manages $6.5 billion of investments. "If I nap for even 10 minutes, I'm much more energized and alert. It's like starting the day all over again."

Kirschbaum is not alone.

King Kryger, managing editor of the medical journal Anesthesia & Analgesia and also 63, finds leaning back in his chair and dozing for a few minutes around 3 p.m. is just the tonic he needs to stay at his best.

Kryger rises around 6 a.m. at his home near El Cerrito, Calif., and meditates before taking transit to the city. For nearly 30 years, he has been taking an afternoon nap, not to make up for a sleep deficit but to recharge his batteries.

Mark Rosekind, co-founder and president of Alertness Solutions in Cupertino, Calif., consults with government and industry about the rewards of napping, namely improved safety and productivity on the job.

He maintains that people are "biologically programmed" to be sleepy twice a day, typically between 3 and 5 a.m. and 3 and 5 p.m. An afternoon nap of less than 40 minutes helps alertness. If you sleep longer, Rosekind advises, be prepared to awake groggy and disoriented --- unless you take a full two hours to allow for rapid eye movement and a complete deep sleep cycle.

Practicing what he preaches, Rosekind, 46, likes to kick off his shoes and take a short afternoon nap on the couch in his office.

Before beginning his consulting company in 1997, Rosekind ran the Fatigue Countermeasures Program at the NASA Ames Research Center. Conducting scientific studies on circadian rhythms, fatigue and performance, his team showed that pilots who were allowed a 40- minute snooze on nine-hour flights were 100 percent more alert and performed tasks 34 percent better in the critical 90 final minutes.

Although the United States has yet to sanction planned naps by commercial pilots on long U.S. flights, Rosekind said foreign carriers such as British Airways, Quantas Airways and Lufthansa have used the research to allow napping.

Major U.S. railroads, including Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway and the Union Pacific Railroad, also have adopted formal napping policies that allow engineers to take up to 40-minute naps when they are not rolling.

Rosekind said it has been comparatively easy to get employers to appreciate napping as a method to reduce on-the-job fatigue and improve safety.

The productivity argument is "a tougher sell," he said. "A strategic, or power, nap can be a productivity tool, but most companies say, "You mean you want us to pay people to sleep?"'