Insomnia Is a Triggering Factor for Hypertension

People suffering from chronic forms of insomnia should be aware of the fact that their condition often facilitates the appearance of another one, namely hypertension. Given the fact that insomnia has become a public health issue over the past years, with more than 30 percent of all US citizens reporting that they cannot sleep very well, scientists now believe that public health policies need to be enacted to prevent the spread of the phenomenon. According to a new paper published in the journal SLEEP on April 1st, insomnia has been clinically proven to be a significant risk factor for hypertension.

The amounts of time each of the participants in the new study benefited from were objectively measured by the investigators, who left nothing to chance. “It should be emphasized that many times the amount that we feel we slept is different from the actual amount. Thus self-reported sleep duration cannot replace measured sleep duration,” Penn State College of Medicine Sleep Research and Treatment Center Director Alexandros N. Vgontzas, who has also been the lead author of the study, explains.

The research conducted at Penn has established that people with insomnia who sleep on average less than five hours per night are about five times more likely to develop symptoms associated with hypertension than those who typically sleep more than six. Participants who had insomnia, but slumbered about five to six hours every night, exhibited a 350 percent higher chance of developing the heart condition than normal “sleepers.”

More than 1,740 people of both genders were analyzed for the new research, and the amount of time they passed resting every night was recorded via a special technique known as polysomnography. The average age of those involved in the experiments was around 49 years. On account of the fact that the study is representative of the US population, the researchers estimate that anywhere between eight to ten percent of all US residents may be at risk of developing hypertension or similar heart conditions in the future.