Insufficient sleep might increase risk of kidney disease

Lack of sleep may be a gateway to chronic kidney disease, at least for women, a new study suggests. The results of the study are scheduled to be presented at the American Society of Nephrology's Kidney Week 2015, held from Nov. 3 to 8 in San Diego.

Researchers collected data on 4,238 women who took part in the Nurses' Health Study. Over 11 years, the women's kidney function was measured at least twice.

Women who slept five hours or less a night had a 65 percent greater risk of rapid decline in kidney function, compared with women sleeping seven to eight hours a night, the investigators discovered.

"This is concerning because as a general population the amount of sleep we are getting has decreased over the last 20 years," lead researcher Ciaran McMullan, M.D., an instructor in medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, told HealthDay. Americans used to sleep an average of eight hours a night, but now it's about 6.5 hours and decreasing, he said.

/By AzerTac/