New York: Chronic sleep deprivation can increase night time blood pressure, putting you at greater risk of heart diseases, warns new research, reports IANS.
“For the first time, we demonstrated that insufficient sleep causes increases in night time blood pressure and dampens nocturnal blood pressure dipping,” said lead author Naima Covassin from Mayo Clinic in the US.
The results stemmed from a controlled study that mimicked the sleep loss experienced by many people. “We know high blood pressure, particularly during the night, is one of the major risk factors for heart disease,” Covassin said.
During night time, in the sleep restriction phase compared to normal sleep phase, systolic (top number) and diastolic (bottom number) blood pressure averaged 115/64 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg) versus 105/57 mm Hg respectively, researchers found.
