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Six To Eight Hours of Sleep Best For the Heart, Says Study (theguardian.com)
Research shows sleep deprivation or excessive hours in bed increase risk of coronary artery disease or stroke. From a report: Six to eight hours of sleep a night is most beneficial for the heart, while more or less than that could increase the risk of coronary artery disease or a stroke, researchers have suggested. The study, presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress in Munich, indicates sleep deprivation and excessive hours in bed should be avoided for optimum heart health. The study's author, Dr Epameinondas Fountas of the Onassis cardiac surgery centre in Athens, said: "Our findings suggest that too much or too little sleep may be bad for the heart. More research is needed to clarify exactly why, but we do know that sleep influences biological processes like glucose metabolism, blood pressure, and inflammations -- all of which have an impact on cardiovascular disease." Data from more than a million adults from 11 studies was analysed as part of the research. Compared with adults who got six to eight hours of sleep a night, "short sleepers" had an 11% greater risk, while "long sleepers" had 33% increased risk over the next nine years.
If you don't sleep enough, you'll get heart disease. But don't let it keep you awake at night.
Short sleepers and heavy sleepers have lower life expectancy. At least if you are a short sleepers, you actually enjoyed your short time.
What if you sleep standing upright ?
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Maybe the people who sleep more or less have sleep differences as s SYMPTOM of some process that causes artery disease.
Could the risks associated with excessive sleep be caused by other factors? For example, somebody who sleeps excessively likely doesn't have a job. The perpetually unemployed tend to have no discipline, don't exercise, are more likely to drink and smoke, and eat poor diets even though healthier food is cheaper. These factors would obviously lead to a much greater chance of coronary artery disease or a stroke.
of the middle ages? They lacked bright artificial light so they would naturally fall asleep early, not blasting their eyes with 100 watt incandescent or equivalent or computer screens with blue light. Then they'd sleep for about four hours, wake up for a few hours and spend that time praying, reading, helping bring in another brother or sister for their children, keeping watch over the fort, invading the neighbors, etc. Then they'd fall asleep again for another four or so hours.
Natural. Healthy. Refreshing. What happened to it? Are we losing our culture and history?
A normal amount of sleep is good for you. Who could have guessed?
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
Onassis cardiac surgery centre in Athens.
You'll live longer if you stop smoking cigarettes and smashing opera singers and New York socialites. And the yachting. Yachting's bad.
It's all good for you our bad for you because scientists have determined... something or other...
this checks out with my life experience especially if I do intermittent fasting, I find I have more energy and wake up with just say 6 to 7 hours of sleep.
Tomorrow we're going to list 80 new foods that are so bad for you it will keep you awake at night!!!
I know it won't shock anyone but I think it's important to reframe that western scientists study westerners. This means that they study people with poor mental and physical health. I went to rural India and everyone spends 4 hours of sleep max. Ashrams, same, vibrant and beaming with energy, never sick. (it's exhausting to sleep in one of those dormitories because they're always chatting or doing stuff like playing games until 2 am) Turkey, 5 hours, all healthy.
Slashdot wtf is wrong with you!? What's next ? - "Science confirms that thirsty people drink water" ?
More clickbait, half-true headline writing from a disgraceful "journalist." 6 hours of sleep will kill you and doing 30 minutes of cardio at least 3 times per week will do A LOT more for heart health than sleeping ever will. This article is useless, pointless nothing for fat, lazy people.
What if the people who sleep more do so in order to better recover from an overall weaker state of health? What if this weaker state of health is itself the problem that leads to a 33% increase in heart disease? What if by recommending such people to sleep less, there will be an even greater risk of disease (heart or otherwise)?
This kind of "alternate cause" thinking can be applied to most statistical studies you see out there, claiming that one should do/eat more or less of something.
Correlation is not Causation.
Sleeping patterns are "symptoms" of an underlying problem. They are not the causes. Deliberately modifying one's sleeping patterns will not change any underlying defects.
I am astonished that so-called researches are still living in the dark ages as far as cause and effect are concerned.
Or maybe people sleep too much because of a bad heart? Just asking.
8 hours of sleep is the minimum amount I need to not feel stressed when I wake up and for the rest of the day. 9 hours is what feels optimal for me, I feel the most relaxed and energized when I wake up and all day long. If I get only 7 hours of sleep for a few weeks in a row, I'll get anxiety attacks. I've been this way since a young child. When I was in daycare, I was the only child allowed to sleep extra. My mom said I regularly needed about 10 hours of sleep a day otherwise I acted lethargic.
People are different.
I thought is was a bottle of wine a day?
of the middle ages? [...]
I question your logic. Wasn't the average life expectancy during that period about 30 years?
Edit: No, I was wrong. 31.3 years.
This plan sounds neither healthy or refreshing!
That is because (a) penicillin had not been invented yet, and (b) neither had the germ theory of disease:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germ_theory_of_disease
The "average" was so low because of so many children dying. If a male made to 5, then there were pretty good odds of making it to 60:
* https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2625386/
Women's numbers were quite lower over most of history because of the risks in childbirth, but generally higher than 30.
Scientific claims backed by multiple independent studies over many years are more likely to be true (e.g. exercise good, smoking bad). One-off claims should be ignored by the media and the public (although other researchers should feel free to investigate further if they like).
There is a large body of research showing people are somewhat sleep-deprived. Most people should be getting more and not worry about oversleeping.
Why Most Published Research Findings Are False:
http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124
Just to be clear folks, 6-8 hours of sleep is good for the person. You don't want your heart sleeping that long.