Many people have difficulty sleeping in hospitals. Noisy wards to visits to the loss of a person’s lack daily routine are some of the contributing factors to insomnia. A new ICES study, Initiation of benzodiazepines in the elderly after hospitalization, in the July 2007 issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine looked at prescribing sleeping pills of the benzodiazepine class (lorazepam – Ativan, temazepam – Restoril) to elderly patients while they are in hospital and the consequences after discharge.

• Dr. Chaim Bell, General internist at St. Michael’s Hospital, Adjunct Scientist at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences and assistant professor in the Department of Medicine and Department of Health Policy Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto