Sleep and Your Heart, 2

According to Jose Ordovas, an investigator at the National Center for Cardiovascular Research in Madrid, Spain, their research team used coronary ultrasound and CT scans to study 4,000 Spanish adults (average age of 46) and the condition of their heart’s arteries. The study found that individuals who slept less than six hours each night were 27 percent more likely to have body-wide atherosclerosis than those who slept seven to eight hours a night—thus amount of sleep appears to be linked with heart health. Ordovas reportedly said that this study emphasizes that sleep is one of the weapons that can be used to fight heart disease—and that sleep is a factor that many people compromise on a daily basis. Other studies have shown that both the brain and the heart work best when everything is in balance. Meaning that too much sleep also appears to be detrimental to both the brain and the heart.