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The Science of Sleep and its Impact on Health

November 23, 2018

Dr. Marc Bony, DC

Healthy sleep is crucial to your physical and mental well-being. At Marc Bony Chiropractic Center in Mataró, we understand the importance of proper rest and its relationship to natural health.

The science of sleep

Studies conducted by Eve Van Cauter, director of the Center for Sleep, Metabolism and Health at the University of Chicago (USA) say that sleeping less than 6 hours a day may impair the ability to react, generate cognitive problems, and incapacitate rational decision-making!

Effects of insufficient sleep

According to their study, sleeping less than 6 hours a night can cause:

Aging of the heart
Risk of insulin resistance
High blood pressure
Risk of severe dementia or Alzheimer's disease
Psychosis or mental impairment
Lack of concentration and productivity
Blood poisoning
Immune system dysfunction

The ideal amount of sleep for an adult is 6 to 9 hours per night.

The documentary «Science of Sleep» by National Geographic (available in English only) - conducted in 2015 - showed research conducted in the 1980s in which it was found that depriving mice of sleep for 17 days in a row resulted in certain death.

Studies

During 2013, in the United States, drowsy drivers caused 72,000 motor vehicle crashes in which 800 people were killed and 44,000 were injured. This is more than the deaths caused by texting and drunk drivers.

Surveys show that 63 % of people do not get enough sleep to be healthy, 69 % have frequent sleep problems and 22 % and are sleepy during the day which affects their quality of life and their work. The major reason indicated by most people is that they simply ignored their sleepiness to complete tasks they needed to accomplish.

Healthy sleep consists of several stages:

Stages 1 and 2 (light sleep; non-REM): Here the biological processes in your body slow down, but your brain remains active as it begins the editing process where decisions are made about which memories to store and which to discard.

•Stages 3 and 4 (deep sleep; non-REM): is a stage of deeper sleep, during which physiological cleansing and detoxification processes take place in the brain. Here your cerebrospinal fluid can eliminate waste products.

•Stage 5 (REM): This is the rapid eye movement (REM) phase, where sleep takes place. In this phase, your brain is as active as it is during wakefulness, but your body is paralyzed, which prevents you from realizing your dreams.

There are those who have had a frightening experience of sleep paralysis during this phase and found the body unresponsive. The «treatment» for this disorder is awareness. As noted in «The Science of Sleep,» you simply need to be told what is happening so that you can get through the episode calmly, which usually will not last more than a few minutes.

Financial data

Sleep deprivation has cost $411 billion annually in lost productivity and accidents.³ to the economy of the United States and Europe, an amount equivalent to approximately 2.28 % of their gross domestic product. In addition, an estimated 1.2 million work days are lost.

The influence of genetics, jet lag, and stress chemicals on sleep

Lack of sleep can be made worse by jet lag. Also known as flight fatigue, time zone change syndrome or desynchronosis, jet lag occurs when travel across time zones disrupts the internal body clock, resulting in daytime sleepiness and lethargy, nighttime insomnia , irritability, confusion and poor concentration.

Interestingly, researchers have found that people with a genetically inherited sleep disorder called familial advanced sleep phase syndrome have a circadian body clock that runs about three hours faster than normal.l.

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