Sleeping less than six hours a night during your middle-age years could run you the risk of developing dementia.
Seven to nine hours of sleep is what’s suggested to be well-rested in the morning. But, what if you get less than that? Maybe six or less? According to a new study published by Nature Communications, six hours or less of sleep could be detrimental to your brain.
For 25 years, this study followed 8,000 people, and by the end of it, researchers found that higher dementia risks were associated with a “sleep duration of six hours or less at age 50 and 60” as opposed to seven hours of sleep a night.
On top of that, continuously having a short sleep duration between the ages of 50 and 70 was also connected to “30% increased dementia risk,” independent of “sociodemographic, behavioural, cardiometabolic, and mental health factors,” including depression.
“Sleep is important for normal brain function and is also thought to be important for clearing toxic proteins that build up in dementias from the brain,” said Tara Spires-Jones, deputy director of the Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences at The University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Spires-Jones was not involved in the study.
“What’s the message for us all? Evidence of sleep disturbance can occur a long time before the onset of other clinical evidence of dementia,” said Tom Dening, head of the Centre for Dementia at the Institute of Mental Health at the University of Nottingham in the UK.
“However, this study cannot establish cause and effect,” said Denning, who also was not involved in the study. “Maybe it is simply a very early sign of the dementia that is to come, but it’s also quite likely that poor sleep is not good for the brain and leaves it vulnerable to neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s disease.”
