Another reason to make sure that you get adequate sleep:
Lack of Sleep May Increase Risk of Type 2 Diabetes
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters Health) Jun 26 - A chronic lack of sleep may cause far more serious problems than a tendency to nod off the next day, researchers warn.
Their study results, presented here Monday at the American Diabetes Association’s annual meeting, show that people who do not get enough sleep on a regular basis may become less sensitive to insulin.
In fact, chronic sleep deprivation — 6.5 hours or less of sleep a night — had the same effect on insulin resistance as aging, co-investigator Bryce A. Mander, a research assistant at the University of Chicago in Illinois, told Reuters Health.
"Just like poor diet, sedentary lifestyle, chronic stress and aging, sleep loss is a...risk factor" for type 2 diabetes, Mander said.
In the study, led by Dr. Eve Van Cauter of the University of Chicago, healthy adults who averaged 316 minutes of sleep a night — about 5.2 hours — over 8 consecutive nights secreted 50% more insulin than those who averaged 477 minutes of sleep a night, or about 8 hours. As a result, “short sleepers” were 40% less sensitive to insulin.
The researchers suggest that sleep deprivation, which is becoming commonplace in industrialized countries, may play a role in the current epidemic of type 2 diabetes. Mander cited a poll by the National (US) Sleep Foundation documenting a steady decline in the number of hours Americans sleep each night. In 1975, the average American slept 7.5 hours, down from 9 hours in 1910. Today, adults sleep about 7 hours a night, he said.