I'm a fan of sleep. Such a fan that I protect my own as much as possible. Only yesterday I delivered a lecture about the benefits of sleep and how to ensure we get enough of it. Some of my enthusiasm for sleep comes from its ability to restore our energy, therefore maintaining and enhancing our general levels of energy and alertness. What is less well recognized, perhaps, is that adequate sleep has also been linked with reduced risk of chronic illness including heart disease and type 2 diabetes.
Since as our body demands that we spend a fair chunk of our time asleep, let's not be too surprised to find that there is good reason for this.
This week a study has surfaced, which appears to add to the current weight of evidence showing that sleep is a critical factor in the maintenance of health. The, as yet unpublished, study was presented to a British Sleep Society meeting earlier this week. Here are what the study entailed and its findings.
Researchers conducted a 17-year analysis of more than 10,000 British civil servants.
The sleep patterns of participants were assessed in 1985–88 and 1992–93. These individuals were then tracked until 2004.
In particular, researchers calculated what happened to the health of the participants if they cut back from seven hours sleep per night to just five hours as it is not uncommon for individuals to scale back sleep when work and other commitments become overwhelming.
Those shortening their sleep in this way were found to have a doubling in their risk of death from cardiovascular disease (e.g. heart attack or stroke). And risk of death overall went up 70 percent.
It is always possible in studies of this kind (epidemiological) that so-called "confounding" factors may be responsible for an association found between low sleeps levels and enhanced disease risk. For instance, sedentary individuals may not sleep well, and perhaps it's the lack of activity that leaves them at increased risk of disease. In this study, confounding factors such as activity, age, sex, marital status, smoking status, body mass index, and blood pressure were taken into consideration.
This adjustment strengthens the credibility of the study's association of lack of sleep with increased risk of death, suggesting that cutting back on sleep might really cause a hastened demise.
Dr. John Briffa is a London-based doctor, author, and health writer with an interest in nutrition and natural medicine.
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