Envisioning the future of sleep medicine begins with an examination of the limitations imposed by our presumptions about sleep itself. Damaged by the overarching sociocultural forces of denaturation, industrialization, and medicalization, the tenets of integrative medicine provide a foundation for imagining a radically transformed sense of sleep and more effective approaches to managing sleep loss. With a greater recognition that we cannot separate what supports healthy sleep and dreams from what supports our general health, the future will emphasize sleep health promotion and prevention. The future of sleep medicine will be integrative in the broadest sense of the term. Beyond the integration of conventional with complementary and alternative medicine, it will likely encourage a richer integration of objectivity and phenomenology, the individual and the natural world, and waking consciousness with sleep and dreams.
Building Global Leadership to Optimize the Future of Traditional and Alternative Medicine
