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Expanding horizons
Sleep Medicine Reviews, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp 1, 2001 doi:10.1053/smrv.2000.0150, available online at http://www.idealibrary.com on
SLEEP MEDICINE reviews
EDITORIAL
Expanding horizons We welcome our readers to a new millennium and to Sleep Medicine Reviews Volume 5, which represents another milestone in the continued evolution of the Journal. In last year’s volume of Sleep Medicine Reviews we increased publication rate from four to six issues a year, providing you with a 50% increase in highquality, state-of-the-art reviews to keep you current in the complex arena of sleep medicine. Last year’s volume of Sleep Medicine Reviews contained 5 guest editorials, 23 clinical reviews on a wide variety of topics, 3 physiological reviews, a historical note and a review of sleep in free-ranging anthropoid primates. The clinical reviews provided state-of-theart information addressing a wide-ranging number of topics in sleep medicine, including: sleep in relation to depression, generalised anxiety disorder, epilepsy, PTSD, SIDS, exercise and surgery; hypnotic treatment of chronic insomnia; narcolepsy; bruxism; the epidemiology, pathophysiology, symptomology and treatment of sleep apnea; sleep inertia; parasomnias and the law; herbal stimulants and sedatives; sleep-stage scoring; behavioral treatment of pediatric sleep disorders; and treating sleep disorders in a nursing home setting and in Alzheimer’s patients. The physiological reviews examined the cyclic alternating pattern (CAP) of the sleep EEG, stress, and the brain structures involved in cortical activation and wakefulness. With the publication of SMR 5:1 we initiate our new, larger, A4 format, providing our readers with, what we hope you will agree, a much clearer, easierto-read journal. With the start of this new volume, we also continue our regular feature of having a Guest Editor provide commentary and context on this issue’s lead reviews, which examine treatments for obstructive sleep apnea. Once again the reviews offered in SMR 5:1 represent the broad diversity of our discipline. They include four clinical reviews examining: what is optimum CPAP treatment, what is new in oral appliances for snoring and apnea, 1087–0792/01/010001+01 $35.00/0
medico-legal aspects of sleep disorders, sleep disturbances after non-cardiac surgery, and a physiological review discussing the brain structures involved in the generation of REM sleep. Volume 5 also marks the publication of Sleep Medicine Reviews’ first Letter to the Editor, a discussion of ceiling and floor effects in sleep research, prompted by the review ‘‘Exercise and Sleep’’ by Driver and Taylor, that appeared in Sleep Medicine Reviews 4:4. We are pleased to publish this thoughtful comment from one of our readers and hope it is the first of many more to come. In this context we once again heartily encourage our readers to express their opinions on and reactions to any of the reviews published in Sleep Medicine Reviews in the form of letters to the editor. Such letters may be published at our discretion. We also invite your general comments and suggestions for review topics. Please direct them to the Publisher’s Editorial Office or contact one of us directly via e-mail at either [email protected] or [email protected] We would like to take this opportunity to remind our readers that Sleep Medicine Reviews is included within the International Digital Electronic Access Library (IDEAL), available at www.idealibrary.com. In combination with IDEAL Alert (an e-mail alerting service, offering tables of contents and abstracts on publication) we hope to continue to expand awareness of the valuable content the Journal provides. During 2001 we will be offering free online access through IDEAL to each individual print subscriber. You may register for this access by referring to www.idealibrary.com/registration/individual where you will be asked to provide your subscriber number (found on your address label). We hope that our readers will take advantage of this opportunity. Finally, it is our distinct pleasure to invite our readers to another year of what we trust you will find to be informative, enjoyable and sometimes provocative reading. 2001 Harcourt Publishers Ltd
SLEEP MEDICINE reviews
EDITORIAL
Expanding horizons We welcome our readers to a new millennium and to Sleep Medicine Reviews Volume 5, which represents another milestone in the continued evolution of the Journal. In last year’s volume of Sleep Medicine Reviews we increased publication rate from four to six issues a year, providing you with a 50% increase in highquality, state-of-the-art reviews to keep you current in the complex arena of sleep medicine. Last year’s volume of Sleep Medicine Reviews contained 5 guest editorials, 23 clinical reviews on a wide variety of topics, 3 physiological reviews, a historical note and a review of sleep in free-ranging anthropoid primates. The clinical reviews provided state-of-theart information addressing a wide-ranging number of topics in sleep medicine, including: sleep in relation to depression, generalised anxiety disorder, epilepsy, PTSD, SIDS, exercise and surgery; hypnotic treatment of chronic insomnia; narcolepsy; bruxism; the epidemiology, pathophysiology, symptomology and treatment of sleep apnea; sleep inertia; parasomnias and the law; herbal stimulants and sedatives; sleep-stage scoring; behavioral treatment of pediatric sleep disorders; and treating sleep disorders in a nursing home setting and in Alzheimer’s patients. The physiological reviews examined the cyclic alternating pattern (CAP) of the sleep EEG, stress, and the brain structures involved in cortical activation and wakefulness. With the publication of SMR 5:1 we initiate our new, larger, A4 format, providing our readers with, what we hope you will agree, a much clearer, easierto-read journal. With the start of this new volume, we also continue our regular feature of having a Guest Editor provide commentary and context on this issue’s lead reviews, which examine treatments for obstructive sleep apnea. Once again the reviews offered in SMR 5:1 represent the broad diversity of our discipline. They include four clinical reviews examining: what is optimum CPAP treatment, what is new in oral appliances for snoring and apnea, 1087–0792/01/010001+01 $35.00/0
medico-legal aspects of sleep disorders, sleep disturbances after non-cardiac surgery, and a physiological review discussing the brain structures involved in the generation of REM sleep. Volume 5 also marks the publication of Sleep Medicine Reviews’ first Letter to the Editor, a discussion of ceiling and floor effects in sleep research, prompted by the review ‘‘Exercise and Sleep’’ by Driver and Taylor, that appeared in Sleep Medicine Reviews 4:4. We are pleased to publish this thoughtful comment from one of our readers and hope it is the first of many more to come. In this context we once again heartily encourage our readers to express their opinions on and reactions to any of the reviews published in Sleep Medicine Reviews in the form of letters to the editor. Such letters may be published at our discretion. We also invite your general comments and suggestions for review topics. Please direct them to the Publisher’s Editorial Office or contact one of us directly via e-mail at either [email protected] or [email protected] We would like to take this opportunity to remind our readers that Sleep Medicine Reviews is included within the International Digital Electronic Access Library (IDEAL), available at www.idealibrary.com. In combination with IDEAL Alert (an e-mail alerting service, offering tables of contents and abstracts on publication) we hope to continue to expand awareness of the valuable content the Journal provides. During 2001 we will be offering free online access through IDEAL to each individual print subscriber. You may register for this access by referring to www.idealibrary.com/registration/individual where you will be asked to provide your subscriber number (found on your address label). We hope that our readers will take advantage of this opportunity. Finally, it is our distinct pleasure to invite our readers to another year of what we trust you will find to be informative, enjoyable and sometimes provocative reading. 2001 Harcourt Publishers Ltd