Studies have shown that middle-aged adults who sleep fewer hours are more likely to have high blood pressure and to experience adverse changes in blood pressure over time.  Approximately one-third of Americans have hypertension or high blood pressure, a condition that contributes to seven million deaths worldwide each year.  It is thought that identifying a novel lifestyle risk factor for high blood pressure could lead to new interventions to prevent or reduce high blood pressure.  Your heart and cardiovascular system is constantly under pressure, and one of the benefits of sleep is that it helps to reduce the levels of stress and inflammation in your body. High levels of ‘inflammatory markers’ are linked to heart attacks, heart disease and strokes. Sleep can also help keep blood pressure and cholesterol levels (which play a role in heart disease) lower.

Laboratory studies of short-term sleep deprivation have suggested potential mechanisms for a causal link between sleep loss and hypertension

Not getting enough sleep is associated with increased activity in the sympathetic nervous system, which controls the body’s stress response. Over time, this activation could contribute to high blood pressure.

In a test conducted by Kristen L. Knutson of the University of Chicago, he and his colleagues studied 578 adults who first had their blood pressure and other clinical, demographic and health variables measured between 2000 and 2001. In 2003 and 2005, the researchers measured sleep duration by using surveys and wrist actigraphy, in which a sensor is worn on the wrist to record periods of rest and activity. Blood pressure, demographic and self-reported sleep information were measured again in 2005 and 2006.  Of the participants whose average age was 40, most of the participants slept an average of six hours per night, and only seven (1 percent) averaged eight or more hours of sleep. After excluding patients taking medication for high blood pressure and controlling for age, race and sex, the researchers found that individuals who slept fewer hours were significantly more likely to have higher systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

Sleeping less also predicted increases in blood pressure over five years, along with the onset of hypertension. Each hour of reduction in sleep duration was associated with a 37 percent increase in the odds of developing high blood pressure.  The study also showed that there were higher blood pressure levels in men, particularly African American men.  African American men slept much less than white women. These two observations suggested the intriguing possibility that the well-documented higher blood pressure in African Americans and men might be partly related to sleep duration.

This study provided further evidence for a link between the duration and quality of sleep and high blood pressure levels using objectively measured sleep characteristics.

Obtaining a good night’s sleep can lower blood pressure and the elevated levels of stress hormones which are a natural result of today’s fast paced lifestyle. Too much stress causes excess ‘wear and tear’ on your body, and increases the aging and degeneration of organs, cells and other body parts. By reducing high levels of stress, sleep helps to reverse these effects and encourages a state of relaxation.