Where I got my information!

Work Cited:

              Banks, Walter, David. Narcolepsy. 2009. PhotoshelterWeb. 12 Nov 2012

             Giuseppe Plazzi, et al. "Sleep Polygraphic Study Of Children And Adolescents With Narcolepsy/Cataplexy." Developmental Neuropsychology 34.5 (2009): 523-538. Academic Search Premier. Web. 5 Oct. 2012.

INGFEI , CHEN. "A Leap Forward, but Hurdles Remain in Narcolepsy." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 19 2008. Web. 19 Oct 2012.

            Kjartans, Jói . Shauna Laurel Jones. 2008. yahooWeb. 12 Nov 2012.

Morrison, I.Bušková, J.Nevšimalová, S.Douglas, N. J.Riha, R. L. "Diagnosing Narcolepsy With Cataplexy On History Alone: Challenging The International Classification Of Sleep Disorders (ICSD-2) Criteria." European Journal Of Neurology 18.7 (2011): 1017. Advanced Placement Source. Web. 5 Oct. 2012.

Parker-Pope, Tara. The voices of narcolepsy. 2009. New York TimesWeb. 12 Nov 2012. <http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/the-voices-of-narcolepsy/>.

             Stanford School of Medicine, . "About Narcolepsy." Stanford School of Medicine. Standford School of Medicine, n.d. Web. 19 Oct 2012. <http://med.stanford.edu/psychiatry/narcolepsy/symptoms.html>.

. "Teaching High School Philosophy." Teaching High School Philosophy. N.p., 10 2010. Web. 8 Nov 2012. <http://teachinghighschoolpsychology.blogspot.com/2010/03/narcolepsy-cataplexy-videos.html>.

              Quillen, Terrilynn Fox. "Sounding The Alarm For Narcolepsy." Nursing 35.6 (2005): 74-75. MEDLINE. Web. 5 Oct. 2012.

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“Nar-co-lep-sy”

            Before you start reading this paper on narcolepsy, let me ask you this, do you even know what narcolepsy is? If not, then this paper is going to be very beneficial to you.

            Can you imagine not being able to hold a conversation, not being able to eat, and not being able to walk because of sudden brief moments of slumber? Narcolepsy in its most serious state affects your everyday life massively. I cannot imagine having my life taken over by some adolescent disease. The problem is most people with narcolepsy find out about it too late; it ruins their life forever. The government should have a stronger system for the awareness of narcolepsy because it is a danger to themselves, others around them, and society.

            Before I continue with the rest of this paper, I am going to inform you of what narcolepsy actually is. Narcolepsy is a nerve disorder in the brain that causes periods of extreme daytime sleepiness, which can also cause muscle weakness. Sleep attacks and excessive daytime sleepiness are the main symptoms of narcolepsy, but other symptoms may include the following: cataplexy(a sudden brief loss of muscles tone), sleep paralysis(a temporary inability to move or speak without loss of consciousness when awakening or falling asleep), and hallucinations (usually visual, they may occur with sleep paralysis or while falling asleep or waking up).(Quillen 3). Now knowing this about narcolepsy, would you not agree that narcolepsy is a serious, hazardous, life threatening disease?

            This disease can only be hazard to those who have it because those who have it are ignorant to what narcolepsy is. Found in the article, ”Sounding the alarm for Narcolepsy”, “Once thought to be rare, it affects more than 135,000 Americans, but many of them are unaware of their condition.” Honestly it is not the peoples fault for being unaware of narcolepsy as they should be, it is the governments fault. Everyone knows what the chicken pox is, everyone knows what diabetes is, everyone know what asthma is, but very few people know what narcolepsy is. “ The average delay between symptom onset and diagnosis is ten to fifteen years.”(Quillen 3). Can you imagine living with this disease for ten to fifteen years, and you could have prevented it from controlling your life. Narcolepsy may not have a cure, but you can control it before it controls you.

            Narcolepsy is a danger to those who have it physically. “Narcolepsy is commonly diagnosed after a person falls asleep while driving and has had an accident.” (Quillen 3). I took the following quote from the article, “Sounding the alarm for narcolepsy”, this quote proves how dangerous narcolepsy can be.When people become diagnosed with narcolepsy after they have been in an accident, they most likely have the worst case of narcolepsy, narcolepsy with cataplexy. This is when you suddenly fall asleep and have a sudden brief loss of muscle tone, which leads you into sleep paralysis which makes you have a temporary inability to move or speak, which can also be followed by hallucinations. (Morrison 2). For example you could be walking down the street when BAM, you collapse and cannot move or speak. If you were to be hallucinating during this, you could have been lead to think for that moment you were still walking or day dreaming of the whole incident until you finally get the feeling of your legs back  and realize what has happened. After having an incident like that most people would be left traumatized, but after that happening once, it is going to happen again, an again, an again becoming worse each time it happens. On the bright side if you can find out sooner than later that you have narcolepsy you can prevent it from getting really dangerous and you can find a way in which you can live with it.

            Please know that my purpose of writing this paper is not to scare you only to inform you of the reality of this disease. Another thing more important than knowing what narcolepsy is, is it being properly diagnosed, so you can find the treatment best suited or you. According to the article, “Diagnosing Narcolepsy with Cataplexy on history alone: Challenging the international classification of sleep Disorders (ICSD-2) criteria,” “…the impact of making an incorrect diagnosis of narcolepsy on the patient’s health and lifestyle, the monetary implications are significant.” This quote basically means that making an incorrect diagnosis of narcolepsy is quite easy but making the an incorrect diagnosis is notoriously difficult.(Morris 2). If the wrong diagnosis is made it can affect a person’s life greatly because they could be lead to thinking they are getting help, but in reality they are not.

            You may be thinking, I do not have narcolepsy so, why should I care? Well, you should care because narcolepsy not only affects those who have it but it affects society. According to the article, " Sleep Polygraphic Study of Children and Adolescents With Narcolepsy/Cataplext", it states that most patients who have narcolepsy, also have RLM (rapid leg movement), even though this is usually common during sleep, it is also very common when they are awake.(Ferri 1). This can be very hazardous because when the patients leg goes out of control they cannot stop it. If a patient was unaware of their condition and was behind a wheel then it could be extremely dangerous. Those who are diagnosed with narcolepsy probably found out, because of a recent accident they were faced with. What if you were involved in that accident? What if you were injured? If you and the person with narcolepsy both knew about the disease ahead of time, the incident could have been prevented. It is easier to prevent the worse from happening than it is to fix it.

            If the government had a stronger system for the awareness of narcolepsy, people could prevent the risk of dying in a car crash, people could have fuller lives, and people could go seek help. Narcolepsy needs to be known! There might be things out there that people might think is more important, like global warming, gas prices, the economy, terrorist but how hard is it for a doctor to ask you a few questions about the symptoms of narcolepsy, how hard is it to put a thirty second informative commercial about narcolepsy on the television? Is anything really too hard to do if it is going to save someone’s life? By writing this paper I hope to spread the awareness of narcolepsy, so maybe I can make a difference in someone’s of life or maybe save someone’s life.