William C. Dement

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William Charles Dement (born July 29, 1928 in Wenatchee , Washington , † June 17, 2020 in Stanford , California ) was an American pioneer of sleep research and a professor at Stanford University and set up the first clinical sleep laboratory in the late 1960s USA (Sleep Research Center at Stanford).

Life

Dement studied at the University of Washington (Bachelor in 1951) and at the University of Chicago , where he worked with Nathaniel Kleitman , the nestor of US sleep research, on the pioneering work on REM sleep (which Eugene Aserinsky and Kleitman first published in 1953) was involved and received his doctorate in 1955 with Kleitman (MD), followed by a Ph. D. 1957. He then went to the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York (internship 1957/58), where he continued his sleep research and in the late 1950s as one of the first to make continuous EEG recordings of sleepers, thus confirming the REM sleep concept and being able to differentiate between five stages of sleep (cycles of REM and non-REM sleep). He stayed at Mount Sinai until 1963, when he went to Stanford University's Psychiatry Department as Associate Professor and Director of the Sleep Research Laboratory. From 1967 he held a full professorship in psychiatry at Stanford Medical School. From 1970 he was director of the Sleep Disorders Clinic and Lab, the first clinic for sleep disorders. He taught at Stanford until the 2000s.

Dement was known for many contributions to sleep research, especially sleep disorders. For example, he developed the multiple sleep latency test with Mary Carskadon in 1975, and with Christian Guilleminault he introduced the apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) to assess phases of decreased breathing ( hypopnea ) or respiratory arrest ( apnea ) during sleep. From 1964 he investigated narcolepsy and showed that it was related to disorders of REM sleep.

In 1975 he founded the American Sleep Disorders Association (later the American Academy of Sleep Medicine ) and was its president for twelve years. He was a member of the Institute of Medicine at the National Academy of Sciences. From 1977 he was co-editor of the Journal of Sleep. In 1964 he received the Hofheimer Prize from the American Psychiatrical Association. In 2007 he received an honorary doctorate (D. Sc.) From the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

He was married from 1956 and had three children. He was a passionate jazz musician (bass) who also played with Stan Getz , when he was artist in residence at Stanford, and Quincy Jones .

He died in June 2020 at the age of 91.

Fonts

  • Some must watch while some must sleep. Freeman, San Francisco CA 1972, ISBN 0-7167-0768-3 . Reprint: Norton, New York NY 1978, ISBN 0-393-09001-9 .
  • with Christian Guilleminault (Ed.): Sleep apnea syndromes (= Kroc Foundation Series. Vol. 11). AR Liss, New York NY 1978, ISBN 0-8451-0301-6 .
  • with Christopher Vaughan: The Promise of Sleep. A Pioneer in Sleep Medicine Explores the Vital Connection Between Health, Happiness, and a Good Night's Sleep. Delacorre Press, New York NY 1999, ISBN 0-385-32008-6 (Published in German as: Sleep and our health: on sleep disorders, insomnia and the healing power of sleep . Translation by Rüdiger Hentschel, Monika Noll and Rolf Schubert. Limes , Munich 2000, ISBN 3-8090-3019-8 ).
  • The sleepwatchers. Stanford Alumni Association, Stanford CA 1992, ISBN 0-916318-48-6 . 2nd Edition. Nychthemeron Press, Menlo Park CA 1996, ISBN 0-9649338-0-2 .
  • with Meir H. Kryger, Thomas Roth (eds.): Principles and practice of sleep medicine. Saunders, Philadelphia PA 1989, ISBN 0-7216-2383-2 . 5th edition. Elsevier Saunders, St. Louis MO 2011, ISBN 978-1-416-06645-3 .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Richard Sandomir: Dr. William Dement, Leader in Sleep Disorder Research, Dies at 91. In: The New York Times , June 27, 2020. Retrieved June 28, 2020.
  2. ↑ Rosanne Spector: William Dement, giant in sleep medicine, dies at 91. In: stanford.edu. June 18, 2020, accessed on June 21, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Dement, William C.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Dement, William Charles (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American physician and sleep research pioneer
DATE OF BIRTH July 29, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Wenatchee , Washington
DATE OF DEATH 17th June 2020
Place of death Stanford , California