In 10,362 adults, night-to-night swings in sleep timing lined up with a higher risk of serious cardiovascular events

What the research found

Preliminary American Heart Association research used more than 1 million nights from wrist devices in the NIH All of Us program: 10,362 adults, average age 53, about 69 percent women, none with heart disease or a metabolic condition at the start. Sleep was summarized over about six months and people were followed a median of 3.7 years. Night-to-night changes in sleep timing were linked to a 20 to 23 percent higher risk of serious cardiovascular events, including heart attack, stroke, and heart failure. Each extra 29 minutes of variation in sleep length was linked to a 24 percent higher risk of the combined cardiovascular outcome, a 29 percent higher risk of cardiomyopathy, described in the release as disease that leaves the heart unable to pump enough blood, and a 20 percent higher risk of heart failure. More complete sleep cycles were linked to a 28 percent lower risk of atrial arrhythmia. An unusually long sleep cycle was linked to a 55 percent higher risk of heart attack or stroke. The analysis adjusted for age, sex, race, education, income, smoking, alcohol use, cancer, and mental health conditions. Marie-Pierre St-Onge, who was not an author, said the abstract does not yet support a causal claim for sleep regularity on its own. Wearable stages are not a sleep-lab recording. This conference abstract is not a peer-reviewed study. Not medical advice.

Evidence level: Human study. A study in people, but an association isn't proof of cause.

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