Study: ‘optimal’ sleep can significantly lower heart disease risk

Seven to eight hours of decent sleep per night: a luxury for some, but a healthy one. Keystone / Karl-josef Hildenbrand

Researchers at Lausanne University Hospital (CHUV) have found that people with optimal sleep habits have a 63% lower risk of developing cardiovascular disease than those with sleep disorders.

For the study, researchers from CHUV and the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) tracked more than 15,000 people from France and Switzerland for up to ten years, CHUV said on Friday.

+ From the archives: sleepless in Switzerland

At the beginning of the study and then two to five years later, they calculated a so-called “Healthy Sleep Score” for all study participants, combining five sleep behaviours. The full score of five was given to those who slept seven to eight hours a night, never or rarely suffered from insomnia, and did not experience sleep apnoea or excessive fatigue during the day. The incidence of heart attacks and strokes was then monitored for eight to ten years.

More points, lower risk

Compared to people with a Healthy Sleep Score of zero or one (i.e. very poor sleep), those with two, three, four or five points had a 10% (for two points), 19% (for three points), 38% (for four points) and 63% (for five points) lower risk of cardiovascular disease, which includes strokes and heart attacks.

The findings were published on Friday in the European Heart JournalExternal link.

“These results encourage us to take care of our sleep, just as we take care of our bodies,” study author Pedro Marques-Vidal of CHUV was quoted as saying in the hospital’s release.

“Too often, short sleep is associated with high productivity, yet a person who sleeps well will reduce their stress and lower their cardiovascular risk factors,” he said.

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