Sleep Loss and Diabetes Development
While polysomnographers center much of their attention to detecting sleep apnea, especially among more rotund patients, increased duties sometimes center on prevention of other diseases.
For example, an inadequate amount of nightly sleep on a recurring basis may help fuel the development of diabetes, according to the results of a study in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.
That study, conducted by Plamen Penev, MD, of the University of Chicago, found inadequate sleep, coupled with a sedentary lifestyle and overeating, could lead to diabetes.
As part of the study, Penev and associates, subjected 11 healthy but sedentary participants to two 14-day periods of sedentary living with free access to food and either 5.5 hours or 8.5 hours of sleep per night.
As sleep times changed, participants went to bed later and got out of bed earlier, with the average sleep reduced by about two hours a day.
When bedtimes decreased from a healthy 8.5 hours to 5.5 hours of sleep, participants showed changes in responses to two common sugar tests. Results were similar to those seen in people with an increased risk of developing diabetes.
"If confirmed by future larger studies, these results would indicate that a healthy lifestyle should include not only healthy eating habits and adequate amounts of physical activity, but also obtaining a sufficient amount of sleep," noted Penev.
In the meantime, polysomnographers can use this type of information as a means of enticing their patients to comply with CPAP use. Typically sleep education concentrates on prevention of heart attacks, high cholesterol, stroke or accidents through the use of CPAP therapy. But there is no reason it cannot be used in relationship to preventing other diseases like diabetes often associated with excessive weight.
The study also opens the door for polysomnographers to participate in various type of investigational sleep studies beyond detection of sleep apnea-related concerns.