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New Fitbit study finds inconsistent sleep can have disastrous impact on your health Credits: Social Media
By Ellissa Bain

New Fitbit study finds inconsistent sleep can have disastrous impact on your health

By Ellissa Bain

A new study has found that getting irregular sleep can have a disastrous impact on your health, both mentally and physically.

The innovative research used data from Fitbit users to find out how different sleep patterns, such as duration and quality, affect your health.

New Fitbit Force, sport fitness tracker
Florence, Italy – January 26, 2014: Close up of the new Fitbit Force on the wrist of a guy. Fitbit Force is the new sport fitness tracker that can allow to track your daily activity, calories burned, sleep & weight, and with that is it possible the upload wirelessly & see progress on mobile and online dashboard. The bracelet is showing the number of daily kms done. image taken outdoor. Credit: franckreporter (Getty Images)

Study finds inconsistent sleep impacts health

The study was conducted by researchers at�Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the NIH’s All of Us Research Program, and Google, who owns the fitness tracker giant Fitbit.

Data from 6,785 people who wore their Fitbit every night for an average of 4.5 years was used as part of the All of Us Research Program, resulting in data from nearly 6.5 million nights of sleep.

Most interestingly, the study found that people with inconsistent sleep patterns were associated with a wide range of health issues. This included high blood pressure, obesity, depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and migraine headaches.

Inconsistent or irregular sleep is when your sleep varies in time and quantity each night and you don’t stick to the same schedule. For example, you go to bed at a different time each day, wake up at a different time and stay asleep for varying durations.

Six key findings from the Fitbit study

As explained by Google, the research, publishers in the Nature Journal, had six key findings:

  1. For every additional hour of sleep a person got, they had significantly lower odds of obesity and sleep apnea.
  2. The balance of REM, light, and deep sleep played an important role in heart health and mental wellbeing.
  3. People with more restless sleep had higher odds of sleep disorders and hypothyroidism.
  4. Inconsistent sleep patterns were associated with a wide range of health issues.
  5. There are big sleep variations between people. Women tended to sleep longer than men, and White participants slept longer than Black participants.
  6. Smoking and alcohol intake were associated with differences in sleep duration.
Sad woman lying in bed with mobile phone and waiting for message. Relationship difficulties, broken heart
Relationship breakup, teenager problems. Female mental health and depression. Social media and internet addiction, wasting time with mobile phone. Living in virtual world. Credit: Oleg Breslavtsev (Getty Images)

What time most people sleep

The study also discovered what time the participants were most likely to go to sleep and the average time spent asleep.

Participants typically went to sleep at around 11:10pm and slept for a total duration of 6.7 hours. However, many also had an afternoon nap at around 2:30pm.

“The study continues to be a wake up call that consistent sleep is as important as getting enough shut-eye,” Google said.