New Study Highlights How Sleep Duration Affects Type 2 Diabetes Risk
It is well known that sleep has a profound effect on health. It affects the immune system, heart health, and energy levels, and its lack has been linked by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to type 2 diabetes, obesity, and high blood pressure. Now, research presented at the ongoing ENDO 2023, the annual meeting of the Endocrine Society in Chicago, highlights how the quality of sleep duration affects diabetes risk.
According to the research paper, less than six hours or more than 10 hours of sleep and poor sleep quality are associated with increased risk of diabetes.
“Most previous studies did not examine changes in various glycometabolic parameters, such as over 14 years. The pattern of changes in various glycemic parameters may provide clues to the mechanism underlying the association between sleep duration and incident diabetes mellitus,” study author Wonjin Kim said in the news release.
The researchers collected data from 8,816 of 10,030 healthy participants from the ongoing Korean Genome and Epidemiology Study (KoGES)-Ansung and Ansan Cohort Study. The cases of diabetes and the duration and quality of sleep were identified from the sample. They observed a U-shaped relationship between sleep duration and incident diabetes, with the highest risk when sleep duration was 10 hours or more every day, according to the statement.
“Even if sleep duration is less than 10 hours, the chance of developing diabetes is higher when sleep quality decreases,” Kim explained.
Previous studies have found that around seven hours is the optimal sleep duration associated with the lowest risk of type 2 diabetes. Earlier this month, another study published in Diabetes Metabolism Research and Reviews found that poor sleep quality and duration abnormal sleep mediate delayed peak or suppress melatonin secretion levels, triggering exacerbated insulin resistance, contributing to the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes.
Therefore, research emphasizes regulating sleep and ensuring you get a good night’s sleep for about seven hours to prevent health problems ranging from type 2 diabetes to memory, as lack of sleep has been linked to retention and memory recall (according to a 2014 study published in Journal of the American Geriatrics Society)
