This has been very helpful, Sasha. My mattress with a foam topper is 35" off the floor. It also has a wooden canopy. It's king size and very heavy. I am clueless how to raise it. I have thought of using bricks but worry about stability. Isn't the angle supposed to be 10% or do I have that wrong? This from my brainy husband: if the bed is 72" long, a 10 degree angle would be 7.2" We're going with bricks, I think.
I really want to try this. Please let me know how it goes. i think we should have a poll: Raising your bed, has it helped? Anyone?
Hi Brown-eyed Girl (great name!) - glad that was helpful! I have read that you need an angle of 10 to 15 degrees. For a 72" (six foot) bed, with a 10 degree elevation, I think the height of the wedge you need is actually 12.7" (apologies to your husband!). There's a handy
online calculator here for right-angled triangles - you use the dropdown menu to say you want to calculate the opposite side (the height of the wedge) and the hypotenuse side (which you're not really bothered about but you've got to put something) and enter "adjacent side" as 72 and angle as 10, for example. It gives you, for a 72" long bed:
degrees, height
10, 12.7"
11, 14.0"
12, 15.3"
13, 16.6"
14, 17.9"
15, 19.3"
This
site (European Federation of Neurology Societies' evidence based guidelines for orthostatic hypotension) talks about raising the bedhead 20-30cm (i.e. 8" to 12"). This
research paper tested an elevation of 18" on healthy test subjects for a week.
These higher figures are quite a ski slope! I have compromised by going for 10" in total.
On the other hand, I have just (while googling for this post) read this
here:
"It has also come to my attention that some doctors continue to advise POTS and NMH patients that sleeping with the heads of their beds slightly elevated at night will improve their orthostatic tolerance. This method was originally developed to help patients with classic orthostatic hypotension diseases, such as Shy-Drager syndrome (multiple system atrophy) and Bradbury-Eggleston syndrome (idiopathic orthostatic hypotension). Those diseases usually cause supine hypertension (high blood pressure while lying down). It was simply assumed, without clinical studies, that elevating the head of the bed would help those with other orthostatic intolerance conditions as well.
There is now documented evidence to suggest that some percentage of POTS and NMH patients experience supine hypotension (low blood pressure while lying down), which often manifests itself after the patient falls asleep. If your blood pressure drops to below normal levels while sleeping, the last thing you want to do is to sleep with the head of your bed raised, thus draining even more blood and vital oxygen from your brain while you are unconscious. It is therefore advisable that patients only elevate the head of their bed at night if they have proven supine hypertension."
Aagh! Must now phone my doc and ask what my supine BP was.:worried:
Anyway, this morning I ordered some foam blocks and wedges to make a big under-mattress wedge for my double bed. It cost 122 (UK people - this sort of purchase is eligible for zero VAT rating which will save you 17% on the cost - adapt this
HMRC example form).
I can't lift heavy stuff and live on my own so wanted something light to use (I will need help lifting the mattress!) and I ordered the wedge in six sections. I'm going for a total height of 10" on my bed which is 72" long and 52" wide and want to be able to take single bed size wedges away with me if I travel. So if you imagine my whole-size bed wedge cut into quarters (once down the length of the bed and once across the width), and then the top end cut horizontally to make a wedge sitting on top of a rectangular block, that's what I'm going for. (like
this picture but without the bits where the model's feet are, and two of them side by side).
I just read somewhere else (so many sites! can't remember which!) that it takes a few days to start noticing the benefits.
Once I've checked with my doctor about my supine BP and once I've been trying it for a week I'll post about it - that will be in about two weeks' time, I hope!
Good luck with the bricks!

I'm very interested to hear how you get on (I think you'll be ahead of me because it's going to take a week for the foam to arrive).