A study has found that poor sleep is associated with a higher chance of heart disease and stroke and that seven out of 10 of these health problems could be prevented if the entire population had enough quality sleep. However, the authors of the work warn that nine out of 10 people do not sleep well at night.
The research was just presented at ESC Congress 2022. “The low prevalence of good sleepers was expected given our busy 24/7 lives,” said study author Dr. Aboubakari Nambiema of INSERM (French National Institute of Health and Medical Research), in Paris, France. “The importance of sleep quality and quantity for heart health needs to be taught early in life when healthy behaviors are established. Minimizing noise at night and stress at work can help improve sleep.”
Previous sleep studies have typically focused on a sleep pattern, such as sleep duration, or the presence of sleep apnea, a disorder in which a person’s breathing stops and starts while sleeping. sleep. In these works it was also common to assess sleep only at the beginning of the study, while in the current one a healthy sleep score was used that combined five sleep habits, and its authors investigated the association between the initial sleep score and the changes to over time on sleep score and incident cardiovascular disease.
Prevent cardiovascular events with healthy sleep
The research involved 7,200 people of both sexes enrolled in the Paris Prospective Study III (PPP3), a community-based prospective observational cohort. The participants were between 50 and 75 years old and did not have any cardiovascular disease when they were recruited from a preventive medical center between 2008 and 2011. The average age was 59.7 years and 62% were men. These people underwent a physical examination and answered questionnaires about lifestyle, personal and family medical history, and health problems.
“Our study illustrates the potential of good sleep to preserve heart health and suggests that improved sleep is associated with lower risks of coronary heart disease and stroke.”
In the questionnaires, information was collected on five sleep habits at the beginning of the study and two follow-up visits. Each factor received 1 point if it was optimal and 0 if it was not. A healthy sleep score ranging from 0 to 5 was calculated, with 0 or 1 considered poor, and 5 considered optimal. Optimal scorers reported sleeping 7 to 8 hours a night, never or rarely insomnia, no frequent excessive daytime sleepiness, no sleep apnea, and an early chronotype (early risers). The researchers reviewed coronary heart disease and stroke events every two years for a total of 10 years.
10% of the participants had an optimal sleep score and 8% had a poor score when the study began. During a median follow-up of eight years, 274 participants developed coronary heart disease or stroke. Analyzing the association between sleep scores and cardiovascular events after adjusting for age, gender, alcohol use, occupation, smoking, body mass index, physical activity, cholesterol level, diabetes, and family history of heart attack, stroke or sudden cardiac death, the researchers found that the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke was reduced by 22% for every 1-point increase in sleep score at baseline.
Specifically, compared to those with a score of 0 or 1, participants with a score of 5 had a 75% lower risk of heart disease or stroke. When the researchers calculated the proportion of cardiovascular events that could be prevented with healthier sleep, they found that if all participants had an optimal sleep score, 72% of new cases of coronary heart disease and stroke could be prevented each year.
During two follow-ups, almost half of the participants (48%) changed their sleep score: in 25% it decreased, while in 23% it improved. When the researchers examined the association between score change and cardiovascular events, they found that a 1-point increase over time was associated with a 7% reduction in risk of coronary heart disease or stroke.
Dr. Nambiema states: “Our study illustrates the potential of good sleep to preserve heart health and suggests that improved sleep is associated with lower risks of coronary heart disease and stroke. We also find that the vast majority of people have difficulty sleeping. With cardiovascular disease being the leading cause of death worldwide, greater awareness of the importance of good sleep to maintain a healthy heart is needed.”
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