Researchers find consistent loss of sleep injures the brain

Sleeping

Editor: There are serious implications for loss of sleep, as researchers have discovered, finding that five nights of sleeping four hours nightly is like having no sleep
at all.

“There’s a huge amount of interest in sleep restriction in the field today,” said Dr. Chiara Cirelli, associate professor of psychiatry at the School of Medicine and Public Health, who led the research that made these observations more than four years ago.

Many people claim to have sleep problems, while others choose to sleep less.  But for whatever reason, the loss of sleep can be bad for one's health.

“Instead of going to bed when they are tired, like they should, people watch TV and want to have an active social life,” she says. “People count on catching up on their sleep on the weekends, but it may not be enough.”

This “casual” lack of sleep can be harmful.  And research since Cirelli's has substantiated that as well. The physiological impact, as well as the cognitive and behavioral one, have been indicated by the information that has been found through research about sleep.

Researchers have found that lack of sleep actually negatively affects the brain.

Sleep, its patterns, its losses its problems, is a big enough area of study and development that organizations are devoted simply to this activity.

Web MD offers another of problems created from lack of sleep.  It causes accidents, for example, impacts how people solve their daily problems, or if they can indeed solve them.  It makes the kind of fatigue whereby some people become literally combative from it.  It also kills the sex drive and has a host of deleterious effects.

In 2014 researchers found it increases blood pressure, creating hypertension that can cause additional health problems.

How can we begin to correct this problem?

First of all, researchers remind us that bright lights, too much television or the Internet, or too much stress can impact not only how one sleeps but the length of sleep and the deepness of it too.  Many people complain they can't get to sleep, but in the meantime they are in front of a screen that influences the ability to get to sleep.

Sleep is a basic need for the human being, with some variations in the quantity of sleep one may need at various ages and stages.  But it is a source of health-building and maintenance to have enough sleep and to be watchful about it in order to improve one's overall well-being