Inspirational Quotes by William C. Dement (American Sleep Researcher)

William Charles Dement (1928–2020) was an American sleep researcher and founder of the Sleep Research Center at Stanford University. This “American father of sleep medicine” explained the phases of the human sleep cycle and classified the physiological basis of dreams. He was a preeminent scholar on sleep, sleep deprivation, and the diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders such as sleep apnea and narcolepsy.

Born in Wenatchee, Washington, Dement served in the U.S. Army in Japan, where he was the regiment’s newspaper editor. He attended the University of Washington after the war. During graduate studies at the University of Chicago, he reported rapid eye movement sleep (REM)—the state of rest during which people are most likely to dream. He received a medical degree in 1955 and a PhD in neurophysiology in 1957.

After an internship at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, Dement became an academic at Stanford since 1963. He launched the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic (now known as the Stanford Sleep Medicine Center) and taught the hugely popular ‘Sleep and Dreams’ class. Dement helped recognize the dangers of sleep apnea and analyzed blood oxygen levels, breathing rates and patterns, and heart rates during sleep.

Dement launched numerous sleep-awareness programs, co-authored more than 500 scientific publications. He published several books, including Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep (1974,) Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine (2005,) and The Promise of Sleep (2000.)

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