The tragic events in Oakland over recent weeks have highlighted the risks of surgery for children. Thirteen year old Jahi McMath underwent routine surgery to remove her tonsils that obstructed her airways at night. She suffered heavy bleeding and cardiac arrest on December 12, three days after complex tonsillectomy surgery.

Every parent knows that a toddler who misses her nap wreaks havoc until bedtime. A new study from the University of Colorado shows that the effects of missing naps may be greater than we realize.

Toddlers who miss naps show decreases in joy, interest and understanding when asked to work picture puzzles. 

Winter holidays are a time of great fun for kids, when looser schedules can translate to looser rules around the house, and things like bedtimes are more negotiable. What’s tough on the whole family is readjusting to the school routine of early bedtimes and early mornings.

To help transition smoothly from hectic holidays and into a new year, we laid out nine tips for getting your family back on school-year sleep schedules:

Getting ready for a sleep study can make you more nervous than a blind date. You've made the arrangements, but there are so many questions buzzing around in your head. What should I wear?? Should I be early or can I be a few minutes late?? What should I bring with me?? Now you're losing sleep over the sleep study!!

If you're like many Americans, you started 2014 off with at least a couple of New Year's resolutions. I don't want to be a downer, but most people give up on their noble attempts to improve their lives sometime in the third week of January. (Here are some really depressing stats about how many people keep their resolutions.)

There are many tips for avoiding this fate: 

• Share your goals with a friend who will hold you accountable
• Put your goals in writing
• Keep it simple, or work on only one thing at a time.

My favorite is "Keep it Simple," so I was thrilled to come across this article this morning. Can you guess the answer to this question posed by Sarah Klein in the Healthy Living section of the Huffington Post: 

The Most Important Thing You Can Do In The New Year To Lose Weight, Get Sharper And Live Longer

What is Unattended Home Sleep Testing (HST)?

Rather than spend the night in a sleep center to determine whether or not you have a sleep disorder, unattended home sleep testing, or HST, in gowing in popularity. Many physicians and health plans prefer this option to in-lab sleep studies because they are more convenient for patients are typically less expensive than sleep studies conducted in a sleep center or hospital.

I was mentally preparing for the zombie apocalypse all night last night. I went to bed at my usual bed time- my alarm set for 5:30AM. There was nothing out of the ordinary, except that season premiere of AMC's The Walking Dead was on TV last night.

What is it about zombies that keeps me from sleeping? I have much more real problems to worry about like writing blog posts, raising three kids and the government shut down, so why do zombies keep me up at night?? Does watching my favorite TV characters slaughtering zombies trigger a primal survival instinct that pushes my brain into overdrive all night?