If you’ve ever wondered whether a melatonin patch sleep solution could work better than your usual supplement, you’re not alone. A lot of people are making the switch — and for good reason. The way melatonin enters your body matters more than most people realize, and the research behind transdermal delivery is genuinely interesting. Here’s what you need to know.
They call it the “hormone of darkness,” and while that sounds like something that pumps through a vampire’s body, it’s actually melatonin and it pumps through every one of us when the sun sets and evening is upon us. It makes us want to sleep. It helps us fall asleep. And it helps us stay asleep until the sun comes up again the next morning. Needless to say, melatonin is vital for good sleep.
Still, our modern lives mess with our melatonin levels in a multitude of ways. According to the Institute of Health Sciences, “the main causes of melatonin deficiency are a lack of sleep or anything that disrupts sleep e.g. shift work, late nights, jet lag, alcohol, caffeine, blood sugar imbalances, stress, exposure to light (particularly blue light), electromagnetic waves and age (some older adults produce no melatonin at all).”
Raise your hand if any of these factors apply to you. (Most of us can probably identify with about half of them.)
Luckily, melatonin is now widely available as an oral supplement or as a melatonin patch. But, do they really bridge the gap for our biological needs or are they just bedtime band-aids?
Here’s what the science says:
- In a meta-analysis study performed by Brzezinski, et al. in 2005 that included 17 studies, melatonin treatment was shown to significantly reduce the time it took to fall asleep, increase sleep quality, and increase sleep duration.
- In a more recent meta-analysis performed by Ferracioli-Oda, et al. in 2013, melatonin was again found to significantly reduce the amount of time it took to fall asleep and increase total sleep time, when compared to a placebo.
“A meta-analysis essentially tells ‘yes’ or ‘no’–that a treatment does or does not have a significant effect,” said Professor Richard Wurtman, principal investigator for the 2005 study. “When a meta-analysis says ‘yes,’ there should no longer be any controversy about whether the treatment works.”
Both of these meta-analyses revealed a resounding “yes.”
So, what does the research actually show about oral supplements vs. a melatonin patch for sleep? Both can be effective, but the patch may have some real advantages. In 2009, Aeschbach et al. compared the two delivery methods and found that a patch was better at maintaining steady melatonin levels — largely because melatonin has a short half-life once it enters your system. The patch takes a little longer to kick in, but subjects reached deeper sleep stages and slept longer overall.
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