Sleep labs in Bangladesh soon

Dutch major Philips India says it wants to help Bangladesh set up 30 ‘sleep labs’ in the next five years to help spread awareness about better sleep.

The lab would detect and treat sleep disorders like snoring that have link to heart attack, diabetes, stroke and sudden deaths in sleep caused by breathing difficulties, but are often ignored in Bangladesh.

Bangladesh has no statistics about sleep disorders, but doctors presume that considering the similar lifestyle it would be as much as in India where it is prevalent in almost 8 percent of the total population.

Apart from diseases, survey shows sleep disorders that deprive people from proper sleeping doubles the chances of road traffic accidents.

A professor of the National Institute of Diseases of the Chest and Hospital Ali Hossain told the press briefing that they get patients in their ‘sleep lab’, which diagnoses the disorder and offers therapies for the patients.

Bidur Dhaul, senior director, Home Healthcare of the Philips South Asia said of the 30 labs they wished to set up, at least 10 would come up this year.

“We did not decide how and where we would set up those labs,” he said, adding it would depend on institutional collaborations.

Philips has state-of-the-art devices for the treatment of sleep disorders, he said.