Adults who sleep less than 6 hours a night are more likely to have subclinical noncoronary atherosclerosis, according to a cross-sectional study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Nearly 4000 middle-aged Spanish adults without known cardiovascular disease underwent vascular ultrasound to measure femoral and carotid atherosclerosis and cardiac computed tomography to measure coronary artery calcification. They also wore accelerometers for 7 nights to assess their sleep quantity and quality. Adults with obstructive sleep apnea were excluded.
Some 31% of participants averaged between 7 and 8 hours of sleep each night. Compared with these adults, those who got less than 6 hours of sleep a night were 27% more likely to be in the highest tertile of plaque burden. In addition, greater sleep fragmentation was associated with a higher number of noncoronary territories affected. Sleep measures were not significantly associated with coronary artery calcification.
The authors concluded that “Lower sleeping times and fragmented sleep are independently associated with an increased risk of subclinical multiterritory atherosclerosis”.
Read the article here.
Source: NEJM Journal Watch & JACC
