Related Issues. 1  Consumer Health: CAM Claims (Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research) 2  Credentialing, Licensing, and Education (National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health) 3  Herbs at a Glance (National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health)
The absolute longest anyone has voluntarily stayed awake before nodding off is 264 hours (about 11 days) â a record set by 17-year-old Randy Gardner for a high-school science fair project in 1965. Before falling asleep on day 11, he was essentially a vegetable with its eyes open. [ Top 10 Spooky Sleep Disorders ].
Numerous other, less credible accounts abound, including one of a British woman in 1977 who won a competition to continuously rock in a rocking chair (presumably by a landslide) by doing so for 18 days. Overall, the jury is out on just how long a human could ever stay awake, but perhaps that's a good thing. Acknowledging the injury people might cause to themselves through intentional sleep deprivation, the Guinness Book of Records stopped keeping track of this particular superlative last decade.