People who sleep less than six hours a night could increase their chances of developing cardiovascular disease, a new study has found.
Scientists behind the finding say theirs is the first study to show that objectively measured sleep is independently associated with atherosclerosis throughout the body, not just in the heart.
Dr Valentin Fuster, General Director at Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC), says while previous studies have shown that lack of sleep raises the risk of cardiovascular disease by increasing heart disease risk factors such as glucose levels, blood pressure, inflammation and obesity, this demonstrates that sleep duration and quality are important in cardiovascular health.
"We’ve known for many years the relation between good nutrition and cardiovascular health; however, we don’t know as much the relation between sleep and cardiovascular health", he said. “…This study emphasises we have to include sleep as one of the weapons we use to fight heart disease – a factor we are compromising every day.”
The study, published in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, involved almost 4,000 participants of the PESA-CNIC Santander Study.
The researchers found that participants who slept less than six hours per day or had a very fragmented sleep had more cholesterol plaques compared to those who slept more hours or had less fragmented sleep.
All participants were without known heart disease and two-thirds were men. All participants wore an actigraph for seven days to measure their sleep and they were divided into four groups: those who slept less than six hours; those who slept six to seven hours; those who slept seven to eight hours; and those who slept more than eight hours.
The participants underwent 3D heart ultrasound and cardiac computed tomography (CT) scans to look for heart disease.
Participants who slept less than six hours were 27% more likely to have atherosclerosis throughout the body compared with those who slept seven to eight hours. Those who had a poor quality of sleep were 34% more likely to have atherosclerosis compared with those who had a good quality of sleep.
Journal of the American College of Cardiology 14 January 2019
Leave a Reply