People with poor sleep for just three nights may be at an increased risk of developing heart diseases, according to a study. With chronic lack of sleep growing as a public health concern, researchers from Uppsala University in Sweden found that disturbed sleep may raise inflammation, increasing the risk of heart disease.
“Many of the larger studies that have been done on the link between sleep deprivation and the risk of cardiovascular diseases have generally focused on slightly older individuals who already have an increased risk of such diseases.
That is why it was interesting that the levels of these proteins increased in the same way in younger and previously perfectly healthy individuals after only a few nights of sleep deprivation. This means that it’s important to emphasise the importance of sleep for cardiovascular health even early in life,” said Jonathan Cedernaes, a physician at Uppsala University.
The team analysed 16 healthy young men of normal weight all with healthy sleep habits.The participants spent time in a sleep laboratory where their meals and activity levels were strictly controlled in two sessions.
In one session, participants got a normal amount of sleep for three consecutive nights, while during the other session, they got only about four hours of sleep each night. During both sessions, morning and evening blood samples were taken, and following high-intensity exercise lasting 30 minutes.
The researchers measured the levels of around 90 proteins in the blood and were able to see that the levels of many of these that are associated with increased inflammation rose when the participants were sleep-deprived.
Many of these proteins have already been linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease such as heart failure and coronary artery disease, said the researchers, in the study published in the journal Biomarker Research.
Further, the team found that physical exercise generated a slightly different response after a lack of sleep. However, the number of key proteins increased equally, whether the person was sleep-deprived or not.
Thus, proteins that can be linked to the positive effects of exercise increased, even if the person had too little sleep. The researchers have previously shown that exercise in the presence of sleep deprivation can result in a slightly increased load on the heart’s muscle cells.
Cedernaes said that “further research is needed to investigate how these effects might differ in women, older individuals, patients with heart disease, or those with different sleep patterns".