Tempur-Pedic Toxicity

I’m really in love with the Tempur-Pedic Cloud Luxe. But after doing some online research, it looks like there is a lot of stuff out there about them being toxic. I understand that visco elastic polyurethane is a petroleum based synthetic, so it’s full of chemicals. But we’re around chemicals all the time, heck, our body produces lots of chemicals on its own.

That being said, is there any definitive evidence one way or the other on this? It seems all the articles I can find are either on organic living type blogs, or on kinda fishy websites that look like they may have been set up by other more “natural” mattress makes to discredit memory foam. They’re definitely slanted articles. And none of them can really produce any hard science as to the amounts of these chemicals that are present. They could be trace levels that were left over from manufacturing.

I know they definitely have to air out, but is that smell from a new memory foam mattress really the VOCs that everyone is so worried about? Or is that just the smell of that mattress and it fades? It just seems like there is so much conflicting evidence out there. Why hasn’t anyone just sent off a chunk of Tempur-Pedic foam to a lab to be analyzed and then published the results online? I mean, if it really was as toxic as these people are claiming, wouldn’t that be the first thing someone would do, get it tested so they could publish actual quantities of VOCs off gassing and toxic chemicals in the mattress? Also, it makes sense to me that a lot of the chemicals used would become inert once the polyurethane is in its final form. Right? And, if it really was so dangerous, how could the EPA and other government programs continue to let us sleep on it. Wouldn’t there be some giant class action lawsuit if adverse health effects really could be linked to memory foam mattresses?

I’ve had a latex bed for years, and I really like it, but I want something a little less springy, and more of the cuddly, sink in to it quality of the Tempur-Pedic. Sorry for so many questions. I’m just feeling confused!!

Here is my take on it (I have a background in science):

Some people are indeed sensitive to the VOC’s in memory foam, but most people are not. Just like we all react to different things. For instance, I am horribly allergic to mold and tree pollens and had a couple of asthma attacks before starting allergy shots, but memory foam doesn’t bother me. Which would I rather be around? Memory foam, not mold, even though mold is “natural”. Yet my husband can be in the same moldy environment that throws me into an asthma attack, and he has no ill symptoms.

I searched the medical literature, there is no good “proof” that polyurethane foam causes significant problems in the general population, but does cause some issues in workers that work with the raw materials in polyfoam factories (mostly increase in asthma). Mind you, these people are working with the chemicals before they are “cured” into foam, and they are working with large quantities of foam.

However, there is the possibility that the foams in use today simply haven’t been around long enough to show an effect, and it would be hard to study any effect.

But here is my biggest take: we need to sleep on a surface that gives us the deepest sleep possible. Stage 3/4 sleep is very important, this is the time of night that we produce many chemicals in our own body- such as growth hormone for muscle repair. If someone is sleeping on natural latex because it is a “healthy” alternative, but they aren’t comfortable enough to get into that deep sleep phase, they will end up doing more harm (in my opinion) than sleeping on memory foam if it would let them get a deeper sleep.

I have tried many latex versions, and realize, my muscles just don’t like the pushback of latex, even in the softer ILD’s. So I sleep on polyurethane because it is the surface that gives me the deepest sleep. I have fibromyalgia, and getting enough stage 3/4 sleep is very important to me- if I toss and turn at night, even on a “healthy” latex mattress, I suffer with severe joint and muscle pain and fatigue. I’d rather get deep sleep on a polyurethane mattress because this affects my day to day life if I can walk up stairs or not.

My mom has arthritis in all of her joints (including her spine). She sleeps on a sleep number bed (which she insisted on). Over the past year, she has developed pressure point pain in her hips. I kept telling her that perhaps it is her mattress, but she wouldn’t listen to me. She ended up getting epidural injections in her hips, which is not a highly risky procedure, but it does have some risk. Well, after the epidurals didn’t help her, she started to listen to me. She didn’t want to buy a new mattress, but did decide to try a memory foam topper. Guess what? All of her pressure point pain is gone in her hips, and she said she is sleeping more sound than she has in a couple of years. She has had significantly less pain during the day, and I think it is because she is sleeping more soundly on the memory foam.

You are correct, our lives are filled with manmade chemicals, starting around WWII. And our life expectancies keep going up…

Our bodies are incredibly resilient, and a lot of the “organic” lifestyle gurus on the internet would have us think that our bodies are incredibly fragile…

If you are most comfortable on a Tempurpedic mattress and it allows you to get deep sleep, I say go for it.

I should mention that there are many poly foams that are “Certapur” certified- I don’t know if Temperpedic is on the list, but that might be something to look into if you are worried about polyfoam chemical exposure.

I’ll be curious what Pheonix is able to dig up, because in my medical search, I only found a few research articles showing occupational increased risk to polyfoam. There are also a few animal studies, but we need to take those with a grain of salt.

Hi jaminjames,

There is more about Tempurpedic and toxicity in post #6 here and the posts it links to. They are not CertiPUR certified and unlike many other manufacturers they don’t provide any specific information about any testing they have done for harmful substances or VOC’s.

There are many complex issues that are connected to the safety of mattresses and mattress materials (and about the chemicals that are used in our society in general) and there is a great deal of inaccurate and misleading information on all sides of the conversation (see post #2 here). There is also very little definitive information available because in most cases the approach of the regulatory authorities is more towards allowing the use of chemicals until the evidence that they are unsafe becomes overwhelming and then changing regulations after the evidence becomes available than “proving safety” before they are approved (see post #19 here). On the other side of the issue there are many sources of information that use fear mongering tactics and make exaggerated claims that almost everything is “unsafe” unless it is completely natural or organic which to me is misleading and exaggerated as well. I believe that any extreme position on either side of the argument is unlikely to be accurate.

For those that are interested in doing more detailed research about organic, natural, chemical free, safe, and green materials there is more information in post #2 here and post #2 here and the many other posts and sources of information that they link to that can help sort through and differentiate the more factual information from the marketing information you will encounter about all of these interrelated topics and can help answer your questions about “how safe is safe enough for me?” because there are no definitive answers that would apply to every person.

Phoenix