The Dangerous Link Between Lack of Sleep and Diabetes

A small but intriguing study out of the University of Chicago set out to look at the role sleep restriction - you know the later bedtimes and earlier wake up times we've all become accustomed to - might play in the risk for diabetes. What they found was an interesting link between sleep and diabetes.
The findings of the small but detailed work suggests that those at risk of diabetes tend to get too little sleep, not enough exercise and eat calorie and saturated fat laden Western diets.
Using a randomized crossover design, the study included five men and six women of an average age 40, who had volunteered to be part of research projects.




The subjects fell into the overweight category, reported that they didn't exercise very often but were otherwise healthy. These participants reported they slept just under 8 hours a day.
The team then put the subjects through two 14-day periods of controlled exposure to a sedentary lifestyle where unhealthy food was readily available.
The subjects stayed in a lab setting where their activity, sleep, diet and blood chemistry were monitored.
The subjects weren't allowed to exercise, but junk food was plentiful. For one session participants were allowed to sleep 8.5 hours a day, for the other session the amount of sleep allowed was cut down to 5.5 hours - achieved by going to bed later and getting up earlier, a familiar pattern for most of us.




Without being able to exercise, and surrounded with lots of unhealthy foods, it's no surprise that the participants gained more than four pounds, no matter how much they slept.
The difference came in their ability to control their blood sugar - depending on how much sleep they got subjects responded differently to two very common sugar tests.
If a subject didn't sleep enough, the blood sugar reading was higher, and there was less sensitivity by the body to the sugar-lowering hormone insulin.
Taking this discovery one step further, it may well be that shorter sleep patterns might facilitate insulin resistance and reduced glucose tolerance, both risks for diabetes.
The good news is that you can significantly cut your risk of this life changing diagnosis by doing two very simple things:
1) Lose 5%-10% of your current weight, and
2) Get a half-hour of moderate exercise five days a week.
Of course this study involved the detailed evaluation of only a handful of subjects, so more work will be needed.




Still, if you're at risk for diabetes, or concerned about the link between sleep and diabetes, it's wise to consider how much sleep you get each night, and make changes to that you make enjoying enough truly restful sleep a priority - part of your overall plan of eating right and exercising to be healthy.

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