Does melatonin treat jet lag and is it safe?

For the past 10 years, on every long-haul flight over 12 hours, Singapore-based frequent flyer Brian Rogove has taken melatonin to combat jet lag.

“I think it’s safe. It works about 75% of the time, and I don’t have any odd side effects,” he says.

Melatonin — a hormone produced by the pineal gland in the brain — helps initiate and maintain sleep. The melatonin widely available off-the-shelf is a synthetic version of the naturally-produced hormone.

“One way to think of melatonin is as an alarm clock for bedtime,” says Dr. Caron Sak, a family physician at Tucker Medical based in Singapore. “It tells us it is time to go to sleep rather than actually…