Help for Insomniacs

A sleep laboratory which seeks specific cures for insomnia has been established at the Medical School.

Located in the Mental Health Center, it is directed by Dr. Peter Hauri, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, former research assistant at the University of Chicago sleep laboratory and psychiatry professor at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, and onetime teaching principal of the International Children's Village in Switzerland.

Paid volunteers are currently serving as subjects, to gather data and test procedures. They check in each night at the lab, where electrodes, connected ultimately to an instrument panel on another floor of the center, are attached to their heads. Electrical impulses from the brain, recorded as wiggly lines on a roll of paper, indicate whether the subject is awake or asleep and, if asleep, how deep the sleep and whether or not the subject is dreaming.

Although sleep labs are not uncommon, Dartmouth's is different in concentrating on conquering the widespread and serious affliction of insomnia. Once the lab is completely set up, Dr. Hauri plans to admit in-patients who suffer from severe insomnia, make individual studies of them for several nights, and prescribe specific cures.