THE BEAUTY OF SLEEP( AND MOVEMENT) Balance sleep and physical activity to optimise your health.

BY DR MICHAEL HUNTER

To optimise health, say the experts, you need to choose a nourishing diet, maintain a healthy weight, be part of a community and not drink to excess or smoke. But let’ s not forget two other essential components of health: sleep and physical activity.

Observed risks

Researchers from The University of Sydney analysed data from more than 380,000 middle-aged men and women over an 11-year-period and discovered that poor sleep was associated with a higher risk of early mortality. The risk increased when combined with low physical activity.

The researchers also observed that getting no physical activity led to worse health outcomes regardless of sleep amount. In addition, those with lower sleep scores had a higher chance of dying from cardiovascular disease or a stroke.

The scientists concluded that any level of physical activity at or above the lower threshold recommended by the World Health Organization seemed to eliminate most of the negative impacts of poor sleep on mortality.

Takeaway messages

Compared to those with high physical activity and healthy sleep scores, those at the other end of the scale( no moderate >

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THE BEAUTY OF SLEEP( AND MOVEMENT) Balance sleep and physical activity to optimise your health.

To optimise health, say the experts, you need to choose a nourishing diet, maintain a healthy weight, be part of a community and not drink to excess or smoke. But let’ s not forget two other essential components of health: sleep and physical activity.