Irregular sleeping habits may increase risk of atherosclerosis

 WASHINGTON: According to new research published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, an open access, peer-reviewed journal of the American Heart Association, sleeping an inconsistent number of hours each night and falling asleep at different times may increase the risk of developing atherosclerosis in adults over 45 compared to people with more consistent sleep habits. Atherosclerosis is the accumulation of fatty deposits on the arterial walls known as plaque. Plaque can restrict arteries, limiting blood flow and the quantity of oxygen and other nutrients reaching the body. According to American Heart Association health information, the plaque may break and produce a blood clot that plugs the artery, potentially leading to a heart attack or stroke. “This study is one of the first investigations to provide evidence of a connection between irregular sleep duration and irregular sleep timing and atherosclerosis,” said study lead author Kelsie Full, PhD, M.P.H., an assistant professor of medicine in the division of epidemiology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

The analysis included more than 2,000 adults, an average age of 69 years old. Just over half of the participants were women, 38 per cent self-identified as white adults, 28 per cent as Black or African American adults, 23 per cent as Hispanic American adults and 11 per cent as Chinese American adults. Participants were drawn from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA), which included men and women ages 45-84, free of clinical cardiovascular disease recruited in six U.S. communities: St. Paul, Minnesota; Baltimore City and Baltimore County, Maryland; Chicago; Forsyth County, North Carolina; Los Angeles County, California; Northern Manhattan and the Bronx, New York.

Between 2010 and 2013, the participants wore a wrist device that detected when they were asleep and awake, and they also completed a sleep diary for seven consecutive days. In addition, participants completed a one-night, in-home sleep study to measure sleep disorders involving breathing, sleep stages, waking after sleep onset and heart rate. Sleep duration was defined as the total amount of time spent in bed fully asleep, while sleep timing was described as the time a person falls asleep each night.

The greatest irregularity in the number of hours participants slept was a variation of more than 2 hours within one week. Those with the greatest irregularity in sleep timing varied the time they fell asleep by more than 90 minutes within one week.(ANI)

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