A recent study indicates that sleeping in on weekends to catch up on sleep might reduce the risk of heart disease by 20%. (Zoë Petersen, Deseret News)
In Salt Lake City, experts have always said that the best sleeping habit is waking up at the same time every day. However, a new study suggests that sleeping in on weekends to catch up on sleep might lower the risk of heart disease by 20%.
Many people are busy with work and school, which often prevents them from getting enough sleep during the week.
Yanjun Song, one of the study's authors from Fuwai Hospital in Beijing, said, "Getting enough sleep on the weekends is linked to a lower risk of heart disease, especially for people who don't get enough sleep during the week."
The study was presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress 2024.
Researchers noted that while people often sleep in on weekends to make up for lost sleep, little research has been done on whether this helps with heart health. This study suggests it does.
James Leiper, a medical expert at the British Heart Foundation, who was not involved in the study, told The Guardian, "Many of us don't get enough sleep because of work or family duties. While sleeping in on the weekend isn't a full substitute for regular good sleep, this large study suggests it might help reduce the risk of heart disease."
Is it a long-term solution? Christopher Depner, a professor at the University of Utah, expressed some doubts, noting that the study hasn't been peer-reviewed yet.
Melanie Murphy Richter, a dietitian not involved in the study, told Medical News Today that while sleeping in to catch up on sleep can help in the short term, it's not a long-term solution for staying healthy.
"Not getting enough sleep regularly can cause stress, mess with your metabolism, and increase inflammation, which a few extra hours of sleep can't easily fix. Over time, this can lead to serious health problems like obesity, diabetes, and heart disease," she explained.
She added, "It's important to keep a regular sleep schedule and focus on sleep quality as well as quantity, instead of relying on catching up with naps or longer sleep on the weekends. Think of sleep as the foundation for all your other health efforts, like nutrition, exercise, or stress management. While you can recover a bit after a rough week, the best approach is to avoid sleep debt in the first place by making good sleep a priority."
Napping in moderation can also help, especially if you feel tired in the afternoon. Sleep experts suggest that short naps, around 20 minutes, can boost memory and thinking.
About the study The study involved 90,903 people from the UK Biobank project. To understand if extra sleep on weekends affects heart disease risk, researchers recorded sleep data using devices that track movement. The data was then grouped based on how much extra sleep people got on weekends.
Participants who reported sleeping less than seven hours a night were considered sleep-deprived. About 19,816 people in the study (21.8%) fell into this category. The rest sometimes missed sleep but weren't classified as sleep-deprived, which the researchers saw as a limitation of the study.
They used hospital records and death certificates to track heart disease, including conditions like reduced blood flow to the heart, heart failure, atrial fibrillation, and stroke. The study followed participants for nearly 14 years, and those who slept in the most on weekends were 19% less likely to develop heart disease compared to those who slept in the least.
There was no difference in results between men and women.
"Our findings show that in today's society, where many people don't get enough sleep, those who catch up on sleep during the weekend have significantly lower rates of heart disease," said Zechen Liu, a co-author of the study.
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