During the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS), several studies have highlighted the benefits of getting good nights of sleep. Researchers from various scientific centers conducted analyses, which showed that lack of sleep is linked with major health defects. It is already a fact that chronic sleep insufficiency becomes more and more prevalent in the modern society and this might lead to important public health implications.

One of the studies conducted by researchers from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor on 341 families with a child in second through fifth grade found that children identified to be at risk for sleep-disordered breathing are more likely to experience anxiety, known to be associated with hyperactivity, compared with children not at risk for sleep-disordered breathing. These findings were just very preliminary according to the researchers, as more study is needed to confirm them.

Another study presented at the meeting belonged to researchers at the University of Pittsburgh led by Xianchen Liu, MD, PhD. The study, focusing on 335 participants between 7 and 17 years of age, found that short sleep time is associated with obesity in children and adolescents. Being overweight is often associated with diabetes and heart risks, conditions that continue to make more victims even among children and adolescents. Researchers also found that sleep deprivation is also linked to behavioral problems, leading to poor academic performance and poor relationships.

What exactly led to obesity in the case of those sleep deprived was the subject of another study by researchers at the University of Chicago led by Plamen Peney, which concluded that people who don’t get enough sleep often indulge on excessive sneaking. Excessive sneaking means more calories, and more calories, more weight.

Also related to children, the researchers at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, led by Kristen Stone found that prenatal drug exposure such as nicotine, alcohol, marijuana, opiates, is linked to greater sleep problems in children. These children were more likely to have sleep problems as adults, the researchers said.

Another study at the meeting looked at the way marriages influences women’s sleep and found that those involved in unhappy unions were about 50 percent more likely to suffer symptoms of insomnia than their happily married counterparts. Happy marriages appear to benefit women’s sleep time. On the other side, the findings leaves open the question of whether an unhappy marriage makes it harder to sleep or whether poor sleep can ruin a perfectly good marriage.

Pierre Philip of Universite Bordeaux in France, author of another study on the importance of sleep, found that drivers who use to drive during night time, depriving themselves of sleep, were more likely to experience fatigue, which impaired their driving performance. That might further lead to car crashes and, worse, to death.

Sleep was also found to lead to a healthy aging when not interrupted or helped by sleeping pills, researchers at the University Of California, San Diego. The study focusing on nearly 2,300 women found that those who didn’t sleep during the day and did not suffer of insomnia or did not use sleeping pills had more chances to “successfully” age.

Overall, researchers attending the meeting highlighted the need of getting the right amount of sleep every night, about eight-nine hours for adults and up to 12 hours for children.

Also, it is recommendable that you have the same hour to go sleep, avoid exercise around sleep time, avoid eating too much around that hour, but, at the same time, you should not go to bed hungry. Leave your worries at the bedroom’s door is another piece of advice you can take. They might cause hours of insomnia, research shows. Find every way possible to improve your sleep, as good sleep means good health.

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This entry was posted on Friday, June 13th, 2008 at 6:34 pm and is filed under CHILDRENS HEALTH, Womens Health, health, nutrition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.