Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) Discussion Board

Hello!
This is a greeting from Sweden, where different "activation bands" have become very popular. I got a Jawbone in christmas present
and been using it since then. It is really interesting information about my sleep I find out there. I sleep sometimes much better than I have been thinking.
I can follow how the deep sleep works and how my sleep quality increase when I sometimes take a Madopark Quick in the middle of the night.
Beside the sleep information it counts my steps and has given me motivation to some extra walks for many days.
Any of you have the same experince? Any of you know how reliable this meassures are? Can we trust the information we get from a Jawbone? If it is
trustable, is it an alternative to all these expensive registrations in sleep labs?
looking forward to hear from you!

Welcome Leena!

Exercise wrist bands have also recently become very popular in the US. It started with just one or two products, but now you can find them just about anywhere (pharmacies, sports equipment stores, etc.).

We have had quite a few people purchase them and ask the same questions that you have, but I cannot remember anyone coming back to us with any firm conclusions.

If you search our past discussions for product names such as "fitbit" and "Basis watch" you will get an idea of the content of the past discussions.

Hopefully this question prompts one of those users to provide us with an update.

I wish I could remember the other names of them - as Steve noted, several people have used them. And, I seem to recall at least two or three additional devices Steve didn't mention (I just can't think of the names!)

I did a bit of research about them about a year ago. My conclusion was that they are not nearly as good as a sleep study. I reviewed research that compared them. BUT - they can give you information that is helpful.

There used to be a product available in the US that went by the name Zeo. The people used them swore that they worked like a home sleep study. The unit was not a wrist band, but went on the forehead and actually measured a few lines of EEG data. Unfortunately, the business did not work out well and the company went under. I have seen a few rumors that they are trying to get back into business, but nothing as appeared just yet.

Yes - Zeo is one! I think there was at least one other that was similar....but I could be remembering incorrectly. I am relatively sure the badnights and EeFall used Zeo and maybe tried something else, too.

I did some research a year ago and found that in the US, there is a company that will do a home sleep study. The mail the equipment to you and a tech comes to your house to connect it. You sleep in your own bed. It was only a few hundred dollars US. My husband just had a sleep study at a hospital - they charged the insurance company over $3000.00. His portion was $1000 because of our deductible. I swear, if I need another study, I want to try the home version!

There is one other device that IS just like a sleep study - because it's used in sleep studies. But, I can't think of the name of it.

Here are some articles with more info ('I'd bookmarked them from earlier research):

http://www.livescience.com/42710-fitnes ... uracy.html

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle ... th-fitness

http://pensees.pascallisch.net/?p=1516

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/03/1 ... leep/?_r=0

http://www.hindawi.com/journals/isrn/2012/768794/

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/he ... eep-better

http://www.emfit.com/emfitqs/


http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-best-sl ... 1412707613

https://sleep.mysplus.com/product.html

I used a Zeo for a while, but the skin of my forehead became irritated and red where the sensors were placed, so I had to stop using it.

It was nowhere near as informative as a sleep study! So I don't imagine a But on the other hand, it gave me a lot more information than if I'd had nothing. It purports to detect "Light" Sleep (a combination of Stages 1 and 2), REM, and "Deep" (Stages 3 and 4). There are issues with failing to distinguish Stages 1 and 2 (Ann's hindawi link leads to a good review of multiple devices). I asked my sleep specialist if the Zeo was any good and he was not as negative as I thought he'd be. I got the impression it was not super-accurate or super-informative but it did give you a good general picture of your sleep pattern, and what do you expect for a couple hundred bucks.

I can't imagine that a band that detects activity, not brain waves, is ever going to be able to replace a sleep study, if you want the full picture, but it might be fine for some purposes.