7 Healthcast: School bell sleep

The back to school bedtime alarm is ringing. If the youngsters in your house are still awake, you're not alone.

"Sleep difficulties do occur in children frequently," said sleep researcher Dr. Milap C. Nahata.

Difficulties that can often be treated with a more structured bedtime routine, but are too often treated with a pill, according to new research out of Ohio State University.

"None of the medications have been specifically labeled or approved by the FDA for this use so we need to monitor closely," Dr. Nahata said.

To spot sleep problems, parents need to play detective night and day.

"Some children are actually hyperactive, where they know that they are tired, but in order to stay awake they will stimulate themselves or others around them," said Dr. Adele Evans of the Duke University Medical Center. "So that's where pulling pigtails and throwing paper planes often interrupts in the class room."

Five-year-old Elijah wasn't throwing airplanes, but he was snoring.

"So there is your typical snoring which just goes ‘snnnnnn.' And then there is your obstructive, sputtering snoring where they go ‘snortsnort,'" Dr. Evans said.

A symptom of apnea, one the most common childhood sleep disorders.

Surgery to remove a giant adenoid and tonsils blocking his airway fixed the problem.

"I do see a different person," said Elijah's grandmother, Traci King. "He's more vocal - more active."

And awake and ready for kindergarten.

School age children need about ten to eleven hours of sleep every night, according to the Academy of Sleep Medicine. If you think your child might have a sleep disorder, talk to your pediatrician or a sleep specialist.

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