Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Sleep and Health

I'm not sure if any of you caught the segment on 60 minutes this past Sunday evening on sleep and health, but, if you didn't it was a real eye opener. Some of the highlights (or lowlights) include the following:

After 6 nights of sleep deprivation, subjects of one study were found to be pre-diabetic…6 nights!

Leptin hormone concentrations are altered by sleep deprivation such that you become hungrier and consume more calories. This kind of makes sense that I you’re awake more you would eat more, but these calories may be in excess of your daily requirements and increase fat storage.

A lack of deep sleep may be risk factor in most of the major cardiovascular diseases.

As we age, we spend less time in deep sleep.

Sleep is not just a primary recovery tool as part of your training, but it’s also an important component of overall health.

One little piece of advice: Try to go to sleep and wake at the same times each day. Otherwise, it’s like constantly changing time zones which makes it harder to get restorative sleep.
Here’s a link to the 60 minutes segment:


No comments: