The effects of the nap depend on the duration: if less than half an hour it can help the brain. Beyond one hour it almost always becomes counterproductive and can be a sign of neurodegenerative diseases
Heavy eyelids, easy yawn, the sofa calling like a tempting siren. After lunch, especially between two and three in the afternoon, many people feel like crushing a nap
. There are those who don't give up and manage to sleep a little even while perched on an office chair, because otherwise they don't connect for the rest of the day, but also those who, if they doze off in the early afternoon, then wake up with more confused ideas. before. Who is right? Judging by scientific research, both could have it, because a lot depends on the nap duration. If short, less than half an hour, it can be a good idea and can even be done good for the brain: the so-called power nap seems capable, for example, of clean up short-term memory For make room for new information to be stored, thus managing to improve learning capacity; the short nap would also be capable of enhancing cognitive and memory functions, keeping them intact for longer as we age, and a recent study by University College London on over 35 thousand people has verified that it also counteracts the reduction of brain volume that you can have with age.
Napping too long can be a sign of Alzheimer's
Woe betide you if you exaggerate
: if the nap lasts more than an hour it can sometimes be an early sign of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, but above all it also seems to be associated with a greater risk of metabolic diseases and it can prove counterproductive if you have sleep disorders. Everything changes for if you work with night shiftsbecause in this case it is a right strategy essential naps. What, then, is the recipe for the perfect nap?
The volume of gray matter
A piece of news, published recently in Sleep magazine, made supporters of the siesta rejoice. Studying over 35 thousand people for their genetic propensity to nap in relation to brain volume, researchers from the University of the Republic in Uruguay and University College London have verified that if you plan for an afternoon nap, the size of the brain changes less with the passing of the years. The volume of Grey matterwhich is a parameter of good brain health and is associated with a lower probability of experiencing cognitive diseaseslarger in those who regularly take naps and in terms of brain aging: a saving ranging from 2.6 to 6.5 years.
A physiological need
The next time our eyelid drops after lunch, then, can we give in without too many second thoughts? Yes, as long as you set the alarm to avoid sleeping until late in the afternoon, as he explains Lino Nobiliprofessor of the Department of Neuroscience, rehabilitation, ophthalmology, genetics and maternal-child sciences of the University of Genoa and vice-president of the Italian Association of Sleep Medicine: The physiological nap after lunch: the organism in its functions follows a circadian rhythm of approximately 24 hours, in which in the early afternoon there is both a decrease in levels of vigilance and an increase in drowsiness, independent of how much we have eaten. A heavy meal can accentuate the effectbut being sleepy around two in the afternoon is normal. At this point, sleeping for 15 or 20 minutes can be good because it decreases sleep pressure and increases clarity and cognitive performance: afterwards you don't find yourself with a confused head as can happen if you sleep longer, for example 40 or 50 minutes, when you wake up in the middle of deep sleep. A sleep cycle lasts about 90 minutes
therefore those who need to sleep longer for particular needs, such as solo navigators, or to compensate for shift work should, if anything, “give themselves” a whole cycle so as to then have a very alert brain.
The negative effects of the long siesta
The long siesta is appropriate only in these cases, because otherwise it seems to have more deleterious effects: for example, if it is used to recover your night's restTrying to sleep a couple of hours or more to meet your overall sleep requirement for the day may prove to be the case counterproductive why then it becomes more difficult to fall asleep in the evening. Furthermore, the 7-9 hours needed on average by an adult must be slept at the right time and afternoon sleep must not overlap with night sleep. This is also why a nap that turns into a nap is bad and not only because it can complicate falling asleep in the evening, as he points out. Luigi Ferini Strambihead of the Sleep Medicine Center of the Irccs San Raffaele Hospital in Milan: Many studies have shown how usually sleep for more than an hour in the afternoon is associated for example with a greater risk of obesity and diabetesbut also to an increase in inflammatory markers such as C-reactive protein
or the troponin
: Napping for too long “disrupts” metabolic balance. Everything changes however if short: in athletes it reduces fatigue and improves physical performance; in pregnant women, from the second semester, also brings benefits on night rest. Even with regards to cognitive performance, the consequences are positive only if the duration is limited: it has been understood that in the early afternoon it is not necessary to reach deep sleep, the slow wave sleep which we know is important for memory, because the cognitive benefits of the nap are linked to the appearance of the so-called sleep spindles, characteristic elements of stage 2 sleep, light sleep.
Set the alarm
In short, for a regenerating siesta, it's a good idea to set the alarm after half an hour or so. Furthermore, as Lino Nobili points out, the irrepressible need to take a nap or the fact that a few minutes of rest are not enough to feel good and regenerated may be indicators of the presence of a sleep disorder or debt. In some cases, for example in patients with obstructive sleep apneathe symptoms of sleep disorder can also manifest themselves during a nap, which is therefore not “compensatory”.
Elderly people
Particular attention to prevent the nap from becoming too long it is necessary in the case of the elderly, because as the years go by the circadian rhythm changes, the sleep requirement may decrease slightly but above all we tend to have a phase advance, that is, to be sleepy earlier in the evening but also to wake up very early in the morning: perhaps we sleep 6-7 hours anyway and after an early morning awakening a nap becomes irresistible and if the duration is prolonged , or if you also doze in the late morning or before dinner, there is a real risk of compromising your night's sleep. The short afternoon nap is good for the elderly, who return to a rhythm more similar to that of children because this helps them to have a better cognitive function in the second part of the day. It is important to maintain a general rhythm of activities, preventing naps from becoming frequent and irregular, concludes Nobili.
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February 18, 2024 (modified February 18, 2024 | 06:41)
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