You cannot separate sleep from health.

One has to be good for the other to be good.

The National Sleep Foundation calls the approach to pursue a good night’s rest as sleep hygiene. One of the seven steps it suggests you take to ensure good sleep hygiene is the sleep environment—your bedroom, the lighting, your bed, your mattress.

No matter how much you may dread shopping for one, you also cannot separate the need for quality sleep from the need for the right mattress.

Doctors speak

Do you really need me to tell you that your ability to sleep is intimately related to your mattress? The fact that so many of us wake up sore or in pain, and so many of us toss and turn all night searching for a comfortable position, tells us what we need to know.

Chiropractors are the experts on this issue, saying the culprit, a too soft or too hard mattress, can easily throw your body and spine out of alignment.

Both Dr. Jon Dominique of Alpine Chiropractic and Dr. Karen Pristavec of Elite Performance Chiropractic estimate 20 percent or more of their patients come in complaining about pain when they wake up. They add that most don’t even realize the problems likely started with their mattress.

Doctors may also attribute your sleep woes to a sleeping position—on your back, on your side, on your stomach. How can you tell?

“If you wake up more stiff than when you went to bed, that’s a pretty good indicator (sleep position is to blame) . . . , “ Pristavec said. “Whether it’s your sleeping position or mattress, if you are constantly waking up through the night from discomfort, then something is definitely going on.”

Do your research

Sleep eludes you. You figure it’s the mattress. Now the search begins.

Finding the best mattress is not as easy as grabbing the most expensive one. You may want a soft one but need a firm one. Or vice versa. A side sleeper will need a different kind of support system than a back sleeper.

Experts at Mattress Advisor polled 2,000 Americans on their mattress purchasing habits and concerns. Forty-four percent of the consumers admitted that the process overwhelms them — the options available, the high price, figuring out what one really needs from their mattress.

When shopping for a mattress that optimizes sleep and minimizes pain, you’ll want to find the mattress that best suits your body type and sleeping style. Look for a mattress that keeps your spine in neutral alignment, provides pressure relief around areas prone to high pressure (hips, shoulders, and thighs), and evenly distributes your body weight.

The highly rated 10-inch gel memory foam model from eLuxury features materials that form to your body to keep that neutral alignment that prevents you from waking up with aches and pains. The gel layer in this mattress is an open-cell foam that allows air to circulate and keep you cool throughout the night.

There are a bunch of details to consider when you are purchasing.

A good rule of thumb: first, determine what kind of sleeper you are to help you find the best mattress for you.