For many people, sleeping for long hours on the weekend may seem like the perfect solution to make up for lost sleep during the workweek, especially after a week of late nights and early mornings.
اضافة اعلان
However, feeling refreshed after a long night of sleep does not necessarily mean that the body has fully recovered.
Sleep experts warn that repeated sleep deprivation cannot simply be erased by sleeping for extra hours on a single day.
What is known as “sleep debt” gradually accumulates with every night in which the body fails to get enough sleep.
Meanwhile, “catch-up sleep” over the weekend may not be sufficient to reverse all the health effects associated with chronic sleep deprivation, according to a report published by The Washington Post and cited by Al Arabiya Net.
How Does “Sleep Debt” Accumulate?
Kimberly Fenn, a professor of cognition and cognitive neuroscience at Michigan State University, defines “sleep debt” as the difference between the amount of sleep the body needs and the amount it actually gets, or the total amount of sleep a person loses over time.
Most adults need 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night to function well the following day, while sleep should generally not fall below seven hours, according to Ulysses Magalang, a physician and director of the Sleep Medicine Program at Ohio State University.
Fenn explains that every night of insufficient sleep adds to the debt. If a person needs eight hours of sleep but gets only six, they begin the following day with a two-hour deficit.
If this continues for five days, the accumulated deficit could reach 10 hours.
The effects go beyond simply feeling tired. Short-term sleep deprivation can lead to difficulty concentrating and maintaining attention, irritability, and impaired memory.
Chronic sleep deprivation, meanwhile, has been associated with a range of health risks, including high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, increased inflammation, impaired cognitive abilities, and insulin resistance, in addition to potential effects on the immune system.
Some evidence also suggests that people who consistently sleep fewer than six hours a night may have a shorter life expectancy than those who sleep more than six hours.
Why Isn’t Catch-Up Sleep Enough?
Although sleeping longer in the morning may provide a temporary feeling of refreshment, significantly changing sleep and wake times can lead to greater sluggishness and fatigue and disrupt the body’s biological clock.
As the Michigan State University professor of cognition explains, sleep consistency is just as important as the number of hours slept.
Maintaining a consistent bedtime is particularly important. However, if someone is experiencing sleep deprivation, they can add approximately one extra hour of sleep in the morning without making major changes to their usual sleep schedule.
A large study also found that people with the most irregular sleep schedules were 26% more likely to experience serious cardiovascular events, such as heart attacks and strokes, compared with those who maintained more regular sleep patterns.
Another study linked irregular sleep patterns to an increased risk of premature death.
