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This book, dedicated 'To the Patient whose need is partner to the physician's skill', consists of an Author's Preface, A Patient's Preface and eight chapters that from their headings give promise of the concise way in which the subject is treated: The Magic of Sleep, Physiology of Sleep, Disturbances of Sleep, Causes of Insomnia, Dreams, Nostrums and Quackery, Treatment of Insomnia, Sleep and Civilization.
The author in his preface gives grateful acknowledgment to Gillespie, Crichton-Miller, Professor Renshaw and others for certain general aspects of his manuscript and pays special tribute to his former co-worker, Dr. Austen Riggs. The author also generously thanks his many patients for their contribution of material and their friendly coöperation in his study of this troublesome symptom. He presents statistical charts, prepared by Mr. Roger Derby, recording different 'sleep patterns' in the author's own group of three hundred cases. It is stated that 'the aim of this little book is to present in a readable and condensed form what is now known about sleep and insomnia, to strip the mask of mystery from the subject, to issue certain warnings in regard to it and to point ways and means by which sufferers may confidently expect to secure partial or complete relief from the symptom.'
The brief preface by a 'grateful patient' is calculated with its brevity and direct, positive character, to give hope to the lay sufferer who is offering the symptom of sleeplessness as his chief complaint.
In the first chapter, after pointing out the phenomenon of sleep as a legitimate subject of interest to poet, cartoonist, movie producer, the advertising and sales manager and the physician, the author concludes that sleep, after all, is a 'natural and largely self-regulating function with a wide range of variation both as to time of onset, time of ending and duration'. The chapter ends with the statement that any disturbance in the 'sleep habit' indicates that something is not working