strokes and high blood pressure associated with this everyday activity

A major new study has found a link between a variety of cardiovascular diseases and napping, leaving many people baffled. Isn’t more sleep generally associated with a healthier life?

The study is extensive and has prompted researchers to question the nature of sleep, particularly the time in which it occurs, something that has been shown to be very important throughout a person’s life.

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The study, published in the journal Hypertension, included data from over 360,000 participants collected between 2006 and 2010 by the UK Biobank. These participants provided blood, urine, and saliva samples, and also answered a variety of questions about their sleeping habits.

The researchers found that participants who napped during the day were 12% more likely to have high blood pressure and 24% more likely to have a stroke than those who never napped. The results were even worse for nappers over 60, who were 20% more likely to develop high blood pressure than those who didn’t nap.

While it would be easy to link napping to poor cardiovascular health, researchers suspect these results reflect a lack of sleep during the night.

“That may be because while napping itself is not harmful, many people who nap do so because they sleep poorly at night. Poor sleep at night is associated with poorer health, and naps are not enough to offset it,” clinical psychologist Michael Grandner said in a statement.

Researchers explain that soothing power naps between 12 and 20 minutes are most effective. Longer naps are discouraged as they are likely to affect your sleep time in the evening and are not really considered naps by sleep experts.

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Aside from the surprise factor, these results are important because they highlight many of the questions healthcare professionals should ask when they meet patients for their routine checkups, and open up risk factors and spaces for vulnerability.