Late Bedtime Increases Risk of Disease Known as 'Silent Killer'

(Patria) - A new study, published in the journal "Annals of Internal Medicine", found that people who go to bed late are more likely to develop unhealthy lifestyle habits and diabetes.

"People who go to bed late have a 72 percent risk of developing diabetes – a significantly increased risk compared to those who go to bed early," said Sina Kianersi, DVM, PhD, lead author of the study and a postdoctoral researcher at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

The research team also found that they were more likely to smoke, exercise less, and have other negative lifestyle habits.

Kianersi explained that because the study was conducted on a large cohort of middle-aged nurses, there may be some limitations in its applicability.

However, the research is based on the general idea that sleep preferences can have major implications for one's health.

To understand the link between chronotype and diabetes, Kianersi and her team surveyed over 60,000 nurses in whom they could rank their sleep preferences on a spectrum – about 35 percent of participants identified as early birds, while about 11 percent identified as definite night owls.

When the study began, none of the participants had a history of cancer, cardiovascular disease, or diabetes.

They were asked to report any new diabetes diagnosis by the end of the study in 2017. Researchers also used a questionnaire to determine the lifestyle of nurses in six areas: alcohol use, body mass index (BMI), physical activity level, smoking status, sleep duration, and diet.

Overall, self-proclaimed "night owls" tended to lead less healthy lifestyles based on these factors. This means that their lifestyle is largely to blame for the increased risk of diabetes, Kianersi said, although their overall risk remained elevated.