September 30, 2007

  • Lack of sleep may be deadly, research shows

    September 24, 2007 06:39:50 AM PST/ Reuters news

    People who do not get enough sleep are more than twice as likely to die of heart disease, according to a large British study released on Monday.

    Although the reasons are unclear, researchers said lack of sleep appeared to be linked to increased blood pressure, which is known to raise the risk of heart attacks and stroke.

    A 17-year analysis of 10,000 government workers showed those who cut their sleeping from seven hours a night to five or less faced a 1.7-fold increased risk in mortality from all causes and more than double the risk of cardiovascular death.

    The findings highlight a danger in busy modern lifestyles, Francesco Cappuccio, professor of cardiovascular medicine at the University of Warwick's medical school, told the annual conference of the British Sleep Society in Cambridge.

    A third of the population of the UK and over 40 percent in the U.S. regularly sleep less than five hours a night, so it is not a trivial problem, he said in a telephone interview.

    The current pressures in society to cut out sleep, in order to squeeze in more, may not be a good idea -- particularly if you go below five hours.

    Previous research has highlighted the potential health risks of shift work and disrupted sleep. But the study by Cappuccio and colleagues, which was supported by British government and U.S. funding, is the first to link duration of sleep and mortality rates.

    The study looked at sleep patterns of participants aged 35-55 years at two points in their lives -- 1985-88 and 1992-93 -- and then tracked their mortality rates until 2004.

    The results were adjusted to take account of other possible risk factors such as initial age, sex, smoking and alcohol consumption, body mass index, blood pressure and cholesterol.

    The correlation with cardiovascular risk in those who slept less in the 1990s than in the 1980s was clear but, curiously, there was also a higher mortality rate in people who increased their sleeping to more than nine hours.

    In this case, however, there was no cardiovascular link and Cappuccio said it was possible that longer sleeping could be related to other health problems such as depression or cancer-related fatigue.

    In terms of prevention, our findings indicate that consistently sleeping around seven hours per night is optimal for health, he said.

    One of my dreams came to fruition. Last Friday, my grandson took a hard tumble. Thank goodness it was not head first according to my hubby, but the other way around. His behind took the most beating, but thank goodness again that his training pull up pants sort of cushion his tush. But the fall was enough to confuse him and a dizzy spell from the fall made him vomit. My husband checked his ears, mouth and eyes. We gave him a warm bath and him and his pappy took a brief walk outside the house.

    Poor kid, he was traumatized and drained that we did not have to tell him to take an afternoon nap. He went straight to bed and went night night. We observed his breathing and I had to wake him up after an hour because I did not want him to have a deep sleep in case he hurt his head from the fall. Early Friday morning, he bumped his head under our coffee table that he used as a hideaway and a escape from his grandma who loves to take his pictures.

    I told my son to monitor him when he picked him up and headed for home. When the little one's mommy called Saturday, she told me that the little one seemed ok and playing and smiling and still mischievous. I had to watch him yesterday when his mom dropped him off to work two hours at her office. My grandson seemed that he had forgotten the incident and he was back to his normal self of being spunky. I assembled a Thomas train set for him yesterday and he was so thrilled that I put it together for him, but I had a problem having the  tank engine go through the railway. When his mommy came back, she figured out how the tank engine would work and my grandkid was so excited and bragged about his mommy's ability to have the tank engine moving smoothly. It was so funny because being with the little one everyday, I could read his expressions like a book.

    Anyway, I'm glad that my grandson is okay and "up and running" like his Thomas train engine. I just could not believe that my dream about him falling and getting hurt the following week, after I had the dream and; he was in the mindful eyes of his grandpa who was 'supposedly' watching him.