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A Wake-Up Call? Revealed The Factor That Increases MS Risk By As Much As 40%

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Multiple sclerosis is a debilitating neurological illness that disrupts brain-to-body communication.

The National Multiple Sclerosis Society in the United States estimates that 2 million Americans are afflicted by the condition.

According to the MS Society, people with MS are more likely to have sleep problems such as insomnia, excessive sleeping, narcolepsy, and/or sleep apnea than their non-MS peers.

The MS Society specialists remark that the physical limitations caused by MS may be the root cause of the difficulty sleeping. These can include more fatigue and less ability to be physically active, as well as long-term symptoms like restless legs, pain, changes in body temperature, and urinary/bowel discomfort.

MS may also have an emotional impact on sleep, owing to increased stress or worry and a higher risk of depression.

But could a lack of sleep also increase the likelihood of developing MS in the long run?

According to study author Dr. Anna Karin Hedström, “we found that sleeping too little or experiencing poor sleep quality [as a teen] increased the risk of later developing MS by up to 50%.”

To investigate this hypothesis, the new study observed nearly 2,100 MS patients and 3,200 randomly chosen healthy adult peers between the ages of 18 and 70.

Participants filled out questionnaires about teen sleep sometime between 2005 and 2018.

The questionnaires asked about how and how well people slept when they were 15 to 19 years old before any of them had been diagnosed with MS.

The participants were asked to report the duration of their sleep on weekdays and weekends, with sleep duration classified as “short” (less than 7 hours per night), “adequate” (7-9 hours per night), and “long” (more than 10 hours per night). They were also asked to rate the quality of their sleep on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 indicating the best quality.

The average age of diagnosis for individuals who got MS was 35.

And after analyzing the data, the researchers concluded that “short sleep” was associated with a 40% greater chance of having MS as an adult than “adequate sleep.”

Even after accounting for characteristics that might alter sleep patterns, such as body mass index — a measure of obesity — and smoking, the relationship remained.

The study found that “long sleep” was not associated with an increased risk of MS. 

Also, people who stayed up late on days off were not at higher risk for MS, as long as their overall sleep duration and quality were adequate. 

However, those who reported poor sleep quality during their teenage years were found to have a 50% higher risk of developing MS. 

It is worth noting that, according to lead author, Torbjörn Åkerstedt, the prevalence of MS is very low, less than 1 in 1,000.

Therefore, the lead author, a clinical neuroscience professor at the Karolinska Institute and a former president of the European Sleep Research Society, advised to “avoid alarmism”.

So, what exactly is going on here? The study team cited other studies showing a connection between systemic inflammation and weakened immune function and sleep deprivation and poor sleep quality. Both may raise their susceptibility to acute illness and chronic health problems over time.

Hedström concluded that “sufficient restorative sleep is important” since it “is needed for adequate immune functioning.”

The analysis, Kathy Zackowski, associate vice president of research at the MS Society, warned, relied only on people’s memories of previous sleep patterns, sometimes dating back decades. 

“We will need more objective research to look into this,” she comments.

“At the same time, there’s really been nothing, no research at all, around sleep and MS among adolescents,” Zackowski adds. “So this work really fills a need.”

She also said the results make sense. In addition to the amount of sleep, sleep quality is also important, especially for teenagers, according to Zackowski.

“They’re going through a lot of emotional changes from hormones and tons of brain growth, since the brain doesn’t finish growing until 25 or 26. All of that is pretty draining on the nervous system, to build all that hardware that we need to get us through life.”

“And sleep is known to be restorative.”

The findings of the study were published in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, & Psychiatry.

Image Credit: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

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