Perhaps we don't need 8 hours sleep everey night, received 2025 10 30

[Colin Howard]

Greetings,

I most times go to bed after midnight but sometimes dose off during the mid
evening and then around midnight get up and often have a drink of water,
then undress and go to bed. On most days, I'm up around 5:00 or soon after,
don't often feel lethargic or lacking in "go" but sometimes it does happen
and then, I need go back and lay down for maybe half an hour. I generally
get up and do my blood sugar test, have a mug of tea and a banana or pear
with my medication shortly after arising, say, within the first half hour,
then have breakfast around an hour to an hour and a half after arising. My
breakfast usually consists of porridge with blueburies, raspburies,
strawburies, apple, whatever, the porridge is made from oats plus water and
milk, cooked in the micro wave, fruit stirred in after cooking. Sometimes I
take my medication with my porridge. I usually have a second mug of tea
with my porridge. Sometimes, I have weetabix with milk and fruit, sometimes
I have Simply Nutty (Dorset) Muesli with fruit juice and yoghurt, no need
for additional fruit as it contains both nuts and dried fruit such as
raisins, peel, dates and other the identity of which currently escapes me.
Having Mueslior Weetabix is not my norm, I mostly stay with porridge and
fruit.

We've been repeatedly told, getting eight hours' sleep a night is vital for
our renewal and cognitive function, the amount of hours you get may not be
the most important thing, A new study has shown having a regular bedtime is
far more important when it comes to sleep and longevity.

According to the study, getting six hours' sleep every night, consistently
falling asleep and waking up around the same time, is better than the number
of hours we sleep. RCSI's Professor Annie Curtis, a body clock expert talks
about what it all means.

"Us body clock experts have been saying for a long time that regularity is a
really key feature of getting good sleep. So when we would be asked about
'what's the secret of a good night's sleep', in addition to all of these
other sleep hygiene tips, probably the biggest one then was regularity:
going to bed at the same time, getting up at the same time, irrespective of
whether it's a weekday or a week night," says Curtis.

But what's "a little bit astonishing" about the new study, is just how
important that regularity is, she says. "They looked at 60,000 individuals
[from the UK Biobank], [aged ]between 40 and 69. Basically, they were able
to put together this thing called a sleep regularity index." The index
measured how regularly participants went to sleep and got up, for how long
they slept, and whether their sleep was fragmented or not.

"What they actually showed was that having really high sleep regularity was
associated in a 30% reduction in all cause mortality, so anything that could
kill you, and 30% reduction in cancer mortality. And about the same as well
in terms of cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death,"
she explains.

"We've been hounded, to be honest with you, about the eight hours sleep.
Most people probably sleep somewhere between 7 to 8 hours, but a lot of
people just can't get that amount of sleep. What this study is saying is, if
you're regular in terms of when you go to bed and when you get up, that is
actually better than trying to get that irreverent eight hours sleep."

What if you're someone who has a regular bedtime, but it's after midnight?
Is that good or bad? "It's kind of apples and oranges at that point," says
Curtis. "They say an hour or two before midnight is better than, you know,
two hours afterwards. Trying to get to bed before midnight is better for
you. Shift workers, for example, they might have regular sleep patterns,
getting to bed at 9:00 AM and not waking up until two or three in the
afternoon. That's not good. It has to be during the night time."

"We can oversleep and that's detrimental to your health as well," she says.
"It just shows that routine is really good. We sort of knew that. You can't
do one thing during the week and do another thing at the weekend. You can't
catch up on your sleep. Regularity trumps catch-ups."

RTÉ Lifestyle.

Colin Howard, Southern England.