Table of contents:
- What are changes in sleep patterns?
- Changes in sleep patterns occur because of sleep 'debt'
- The impact of changes in sleep patterns on health
- 1. Impaired hormone secretion
- 2. Trigger obesity
- 3. Increase cardiovascular risk
- 4. Diabetes mellitus
Sleep patterns are our habitual patterns of resting our bodies by falling asleep. This includes hours of sleep and how long we were asleep. This is the reason why we, under normal circumstances, tend to be active during the day and fall asleep at night until morning. Normal sleep patterns in adults take approximately 7 hours at night. Lack or lack of sleep is a major cause of changes in sleep patterns.
What are changes in sleep patterns?
Changes in sleep patterns are changes in a person's habit of falling asleep, within 24 hours a day, including sleeping at night and taking naps. Changes in sleep patterns are closely related to changes in the cycle of sleep and wakefulness. When a person has a change in schedule and the amount of time to fall asleep and stay awake, that's when sleep patterns change.
Changes in sleep patterns occur because of sleep 'debt'
Changes in sleep patterns usually begin with a change in waking time. This can be caused by factors of age, busyness, activity, exercise habits, stress, and various environmental conditions. Reduced time to fall asleep (sleep loss) is the most frequent trigger for changes in sleep patterns. The difference between sleep time and normal sleep time will become a "debt" (sleep debt) that can accumulate. The debt must be paid in addition to sleep time, whenever that is.
The time lost sleep is usually paid for by sleeping at other times we would normally not have fallen asleep. Well, that's when changes in sleep patterns occur. Changes in sleep patterns generally cause a person to sleep during the day, sleep earlier or later, and even sleep at night for a longer period of time. However, some people fall asleep longer on weekends to compensate for the lack of sleep during weekdays, and this is known as social jetlag .
In contrast to lack of sleep, changes in sleep patterns can also be caused by lack of sleep. Both can reduce mental and physical performance due to lack of sleep. Directly, someone with a change in sleep time is at risk for or is already experiencing the effects of sleep deprivation.
The impact of changes in sleep patterns on health
Changes in sleep time are the result of the body's mechanism to balance one's resting time, although the effect is that a person falls asleep at an abnormal time (afternoon or morning) due to a "breakdown" of the biological clock. Here are some of the health problems experienced by someone with changes in sleep patterns:
1. Impaired hormone secretion
When we sleep, this is the time for the body to produce various hormones important for the body's metabolic function. For example, the hormone cortisol which functions to keep us awake during the day, growth hormone which helps regulate muscle mass growth, reproductive hormone; and FSH (Follicle Stimulating Hormone) and LH (Luteinizing Hormone) which regulates the function of the reproductive organs and development at puberty. Lack of sleep at night will interfere with the secretion and performance of these hormones, even if you have added nap time.
2. Trigger obesity
It's not just a lack of sleep. Changes in sleep patterns that cause a person to lack sleep at night trigger the secretion of hormones that cause obesity. This hormone triggers hunger pangs during the day and causes a person to want to eat more food. Once the desire to eat is fulfilled, it is possible that the individual begins to become drowsy due to lack of sleep at night. The result is a lack of activity during the day and unused energy is stored as fat.
Other hormone secretion disorders can also cause obesity indirectly, including growth hormone. Too little secretion of growth hormone reduces muscle mass. The less the proportion of muscle mass, the greater the proportion of fat. Research by Yu and colleagues shows that adult and elderly men with changes in sleep patterns or waking habits at night are at risk of losing muscle mass (sarcopenia) by four times that of individuals with normal sleep patterns. This tendency causes a person to become fat more easily with age.
3. Increase cardiovascular risk
It may be common knowledge that lack of sleep can cause disruption in heart performance. However, recent research by Dr. Patricia Wong showed that changes in sleep patterns also increase blood fat levels. Changes in sleep patterns will cause a lack of rest time at night, as a result we change it at another time. However, sleeping at abnormal times will disrupt the body's metabolism during the day so that blood fat levels tend to increase. This will increase the risk of clogged arteries and high blood pressure. So that someone who experiences changes in sleep patterns will be more susceptible to various cardiovascular diseases.
4. Diabetes mellitus
Abnormal sleep times due to changes in sleep patterns, especially on weekends, can also raise blood sugar levels. The body will also produce less of a balancing component of blood sugar levels when a person sleeps from day to evening. Research by Yu and colleagues also showed that individual changes in sleep patterns caused the risk of developing diabetes mellitus to increase by about 1.7 times higher even in the male group about 3 times the risk of experiencing diabetes symptoms.
