Light and Health

Alyssa Hankus
08-30-11

Being a cancer survivor this is not the first time my attention has been drawn to the relationship between light and wellbeing. Often times when needing to heal and recover I needed darkness in my room to allow for sleep. This is exceptionally difficult to achieve in hospitals. Light leaks from everywhere. It is not the natural light, however, that is the problem, it is the artificial. It leaks from under the door cracks, the emergency lights, and lights used for way finding once the sun sets. However, natural light had a huge impact on how I would feel each day. Should I feel just well enough to sit up and be by a window my mood, and my health would be tremendously better. So I can relate to the article when it spoke about circadian rhythm.

I found it interesting when the article spoke about prolonged exposure to artificial light, or irregular lighting and the effects it would have on the human body, or SAD (seasonal affective disorder). Many times I do not think that we, even as designers take into account the effect of the lighting we place into spaces in the sense of health risks. The fact that nurses are having higher occurrences of cancer when working the night shift is alarming. Honestly, I would never have thought to study that prior.

I also found it interesting when the reading spoke about the differences in our productivity, and our ability to function as compared to daylight savings time. It makes sense that our bodies would function and changed based on the cycle of the sun vs. manmade hours. I question if we would be healthier if we simply went by the sun’s cycle vs. modifying the hourly system.

These articles have certainly raised questions, and were thought provoking. I would be curious to do more research on the matter.