Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep by William C. Dement, and: Advances in Sleep Research ed. by Elliot D. Weitzman (review)

Abstract

which smooths our rough points and makes the appropriate corrections. Plodd keeps us on the track with an external rather than internal gyroscope. William B. Bean, M.D. University of Texas Medical Branch Galveston Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep. By William C. Dement. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman & Co., 1974. Pp. xiii+148. $5.95 (cloth); $3.50 (paper). Advances in Sleep Research. Vol. 2. Edited by Elliot D. Weitzman. New York: Spectrum Publications, Inc. Distributed by Halsted Press, 1976. Pp. 236. $20.00. Dr. Dement, who trained with Aserinsky in Kleitman's laboratory at the University of Chicago, compiled the first book from his popular course on sleep and dreaming at Stanford University. Its success can be judged from this reprint of the 1972 edition and the simultaneous publication of a paperback edition. It is a fine book, imaginatively illustrated with reproductions of works by Picasso and very good drawings by Jim M'Guinness, while the appendixes contain appropriate photographs, a glossary of terms, and a reader's guide. For both the scholar and the general reader who desires to know "what it is that lures us each night from our work, our games, our loved ones, into the solitary world of sleep," this is the best book available at a remarkably low price. The second book is notable in editor Weitzman's choice of 28 multidisciplinary contributors—William C. Dement presenting a sophisticated and detailed opening chapter entitled "Neurophysiological Substrates of the Changes in Respiration during Sleep," with his co-worker John Orem. There follows a masterful review of "Maturation of Sleep Patterns of the Newborn Infant," by psychiatrist Thomas F. Anders, and an outstanding "Normal Motor Patterns in Sleep in Man," by R. Gardner and W. I. Grossman. The rest of the book contains much new work by eminent Japanese from neuropsychiatrie and physiology sleepdisorder laboratories in Tokyo, Nagoya City, Yonago City, Kanagawa, and Osaka. The Japanese are prominent among neurophysiologic researchers, and many original observations are reported in clear English. Hara, Masuda, and Miyake show the different effects of psychotropic drugs on each region of the cat brain stem; they found that neither benzodiazepines nor ketamine nor gamma-hydroxybutyrate injected during the REM sleep period prevented reappearance ofREM sleep, contrary to the effect of pentobarbital. This emphasis on regional brain influences is just one of the interesting themes of sleep research reported in this sophisticated book. Unlike the more general primer of Dement, it is a critical review ofbasic aspects ofsleep research for serious scholars not only in the psychological, neurological, and psychiatric fields but also in other medical disciplines such as anesthesiology. Jacobus W. Mostert, M.D. University of Chicago Perspectives in Biology and Medicine ¦ Spring 1977 | 469 ...