Key Findings
- Many chemicals can act as hypnotics, but most are prescription drugs.
- Benzodiazepine sleep aids work well but also have sideâeffects and dependence risk.
- Endogenous (bodyâmade) sleepâpromoting substances are being studied but arenât yet usable as therapies.
Practical Outcomes
- For biohackers, the takeaway is that most effective sleep aids are already known pharmaceuticals with known risks, and any ânaturalâ peptideâbased sleep aids are still experimental and not ready for selfâexperimentation.
Summary
The paper just gives a broad overview of sleepâinducing drugs, especially benzodiazepines, and mentions that natural sleepâboosting molecules are still under research and not ready for use.
Abstract
An overview of substances with hypnotic properties and of genuine hypnotics is provided. Desired and undesired properties of benzodiazepine hypnotics are discussed. Although several endogenous sleep-promoting substances are being intensively investigated, their application in therapy is not yet in view.
Study Information
Provider
pubmed
Year
1990
Date
1990-05-08T00:00:00.000Z