(HealthDay News) [The shift to daylight savings time tonight] may not be such a welcome change for people with seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a seasonal depression that occurs in the fall and winter and is caused, at least in part, by the lack of daylight during these seasons. Some experts suspect that light in the morning may be especially important for helping people with SAD, as well as for jumpstarting circadian rhythms in all people…
"The hallmark of seasonal affective disorder is a pattern of depression that occurs in the fall and winter months that improves in the spring. There's a definite seasonal pattern," explained Dr. Emil Coccaro… "They have a major depression in the fall and winter when there's less light and they recover when there's more and more light."
The main treatment for SAD is exposure to bright lights, he said. And, during the fall and winter, people with SAD do this using light boxes that flood extra light into an area.
Community: I’m somewhat susceptible to the change in time. I’ve put a very bright light in the room where I do my early morning work, so we’ll see if it keeps me from feeling like I’m suffering from jet lag for the next few days, as I normally do. I like having light longer later in the day, so I wish we’d just stay on daylight savings time all year round.
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