Sleep and hypertension

From the Johns Hopkins Medicine Health Alert report:

“Researchers may have found a connection between sleep habits and high pressure. In a study reported in the journal Hypertension (Vol. 47, p. 833) researchers studied more than 4,800 Americans and found that young and middle-aged folks who clocked five or fewer hours of sleep each night were 60% more likely than their well-rested peers to develop hypertension over the next decade. Lack of sleep did not appear to raise pressure in people older than age 59, however.

The link between sleep habits and pressure remained even after the researchers controlled for weight, depression, smoking, and physical activity levels. This means there may be something about chronic sleep deprivation that raises a person’s pressure.

One possibility is that people who get little sleep have more exposure to the elevations in heart rate, pressure, and nervous system activity that come with being awake. As a result, the body may adapt to these chronic elevations by operating at a new, higher level. Chronic sleep deprivation might also throw a wrench in the central “clock” in your brain, which governs the rhythm of bodily processes, including pressure control.”

In addition, other studies have shown that sleep deprivation also causes a person to overeat and/or make less than ideal food choices (e.g., fast foods). The lesson here is that adequate rest is an important variable in the weight management equation.