16 October 2005
What Losing Sleep Does to a Body
Posted by Mikhail Esteves under: General .
Washington Post has an interesting article on Scientists Finding Out What Loosing Sleep Does to a Body
While many aspects of sleep remain a mystery — including exactly why we sleep — the picture that appears to be emerging is that not sleeping enough or being awake in the wee hours runs counter to the body’s internal clock, throwing a host of basic bodily functions out of sync.
“Lack of sleep disrupts every physiologic function in the body,” said Eve Van Cauter of the University of Chicago. “We have nothing in our biology that allows us to adapt to this behavior.”
The amount of necessary sleep varies from person to person, with some breezing through their days on just a few hours’ slumber and others barely functioning without a full 10 hours, experts say. But most people apparently need between about seven and nine hours, with studies indicating that an increased risk for disease starts to kick in when people get less than six or seven, experts say.
Scientists have long known that sleep disorders, such as sleep apnea, narcolepsy and chronic insomnia, can lead to serious health problems, and that difficulty sleeping may be a red flag for a serious illness. But the first clues that otherwise healthy people who do not get enough sleep or who shift their sleep schedules because of work, family or lifestyle may be endangering their health emerged from large epidemiological studies that found people who slept the least appeared to be significantly more likely to die.