New research presented at the recent European Society of Cardiology meeting in Scavenger Norway, recently concluded that poor sleep doubles hospitalizations among individuals with heart failure.
As summarized in a press release from the European Society of Cardiology, Swedish researcher Peter Johansson, first author of the study which will be titled “Poor sleep doubles hospitalisations in heart failure patients“and a heart failure nurse at the University Hospital of Linköping, Sweden, said: “Sleep is important for everyone and we all have to sleep to feel good. We know that sleep problems are common among patients with heart failure. But until now there was no data on whether poor sleep persists over time and how that relates to hospitalizations.”
The study included 499 patients hospitalized for heart failure who participated in the evaluating Outcomes of Advising and Counseling in Heart failure study. After 12 months the researchers recorded the number and cause of unplanned hospitalizations during the follow up period and assessed sleep again. Researchers found that 215 patients (43 percent) had sleep problems at discharge from the initial hospitalization and nearly one-third (30 percent) had continued sleep problems at 12 months.
Patients with continued sleep problems were two times more likely to be hospitalized during the followup period than those without any sleep problems. Risk was double for all-cause hospitalizations and for cardiovascular hospitalizations.
“Our finding that consistently poor sleep leads to twice as many hospitalizations in patients with heart failure underlines the impact that sleep can have on health,” said Johansson. “In Sweden we don’t generally ask our heart failure patients about sleep and this study shows that we should. If patients say their sleep is poor that may be a warning signal to investigate the reasons.”
Source: ESC Press Office
