Good sleep increases life expectancy
Getting goodsleepcan play a role in supporting heartand overall health—and perhaps even longevity—according to new research presented at the American College of Cardiology’s annual scientific session in conjunction with the World Congress of Cardiology. The study found that young people who have healthy sleep habits are less likely to die early. Furthermore, data indicate that about 8% of deaths from any cause can be attributed to poor sleep patterns.
Medical data indicate that there is a clear relationship between the drug dose and the extent of response in achieving the desired result. So the more positive factors a person has – including better sleep quality – the better their response to medication. Thus, a gradual reduction in all causes of death, including those related to cardiovascular diseases.
Doctor Frank Qian, a fellow at Harvard Medical School and co-author of the study, says: “I believe that these results confirm that simply getting sufficient hours of sleep is not the only necessity, as the quality of these hours plays an important role in determining whether the person has obtained the required rest or not.”
The first study of its kind
To conduct the study, Kian and his team collected data from 172,321 people (average age 50 years, 54% female) who participated in the National Health Interview Survey, which took place between 2013 and 2018 in the United States, and the survey included questions about sleep habits.
This study is considered the first of its kind – according to its author – to use a population group, to find out how many sleep behaviors affect general health and life expectancy, and not just sleep duration.
Because the researchers were able to link participants to the National Death Index records in the United States (until December 31, 2019), they were able to examine the causes of death for each person, and correlate them with the sleep habits that they reported in the survey.
Survey participants were followed over a period of 3-4 years, during which 8,681 people died, and of these deaths, 2,610 (30%) were due to cardiovascular disease, 2,052 (24%) were due to cancer, and 4,019 (46%) were due to other causes.
To translate this data statistically, the researchers identified five different sleep quality factors, which they created based on answers collected as part of the survey. These factors are: the ideal sleep duration is seven to eight hours per night, difficulty falling asleep no more than twice a week, inability to stay asleep no more than twice a week, not using any sleep medication, and finally feeling rested after waking up five days a week – at least. According to the survey participant’s answer to each factor, a rating is given either (zero) if the answer is negative, or (one) when the answer is positive, and in the end the total expresses the quality of sleep on a scale from (zero) to (five), taking into account that (five) is an ideal rating.
Kian said: “If people have all of these ideal sleep behaviors, they are likely to live longer. Therefore, if we can improve sleep in general, while identifying and treating sleep disorders in particular; We may be able to prevent some of these premature deaths.”
To obtain more accurate results, the researchers controlled for other factors that may increase the risk of death, including low socioeconomic status, smoking, alcohol consumption, and other medical conditions.
The effect of sleep quality on lifespan
The study highlights – for many doctors – the need to take into account the patient’s sleep habits when diagnosing him, and this can be easily done during patients’ visits to various clinics, and the researchers hope that patients and doctors will start talking about sleep, as part of a comprehensive health assessment and disease management planning.
One of the problems in dealing with the results of this study is that the survey included participants’ self-reporting of their sleep habits, without them being measured or verified objectively. In addition, no information was available about the types of sleep aids or other medications used – whose side effects include sleep – whether the number of times they are used, or the duration of their use. Therefore, there is a need for future research that takes this study as a starting point, to understand how this increase in life expectancy can continue as it advances, as well as to explore the observed differences between the sexes.
Studies have also shown that getting too little sleep – or even too much sleep – can negatively affect the heart, as it has also been widely reported that sleep apnea (a disorder that causes breathing to decrease or stop) can lead to a number of heart diseases, including high blood pressure, atrial fibrillation, and seizures. Cardiac.
In conclusion, we emphasize that getting adequate rest is necessary and inevitable. So that a person can practice various activities in a healthy manner, in addition to maintaining the health of the body in the long term, with a healthy diet and regular exercise, even by walking half an hour daily. A healthy mind is a healthy body!
