Did you know insomnia could possibly kill you with a heart attack?

Insomnia is a situation where a person is not able to sleep even when willing to. People with insomnia find it so difficult to sleep that they may end up having to rely on drugs to be able to have a normal sleep like every other person. Recent research seems to suggest that people with insomnia also incur a higher risk of developing a heart attack or even a stroke. This is precisely why it is so important to know heart attack signs and symptoms.

It is already known that not been able to sleep will eventually lead a person to other forms of sickness. A body that did not receive enough sleep will tend to be stressed. Stress weakens the immune system of a person. Once the immune system is weak, other pathogens can easily get in and cause diseases.

Dr. Gregg Fonarow, a professor at the UCLA university had already pointed out that factors like stress and diabetes are known to cause heart attacks. Those same factors also play a role in causing insomnia.

A recent study seems to confirm that. That new study was undertaken by Dr. Chien-Yi Hsu from the Taipei Veterans General Hospital. In the research the group of scientists were able to identify a population of 11 000 members suffering from insomnia and 32 000 members not suffering from insomnia. The age of these 2 group of population is around 45 years old.

The scientists then did a comparative analysis to see if the mere fact of having insomnia could have a consequence on the incidence of heart attack and stroke.

The research was conducted for about 4 years and the results seems to suggest what the researchers suspected all along. The incidence of heart attack in insomniacs was about twice more than in the population without insomnia. That is 1.6% in insomniacs compare to 0.76% in the population without insomnia.

Aside that the insomniac population experienced 11.2% stroke while the population without insomnia had about 6.5% stroke.

From that data it can be seen that insomnia seems to play a role in the incidence of heart attacks and stroke. That said, some more studies need to be done to confirm the research.

There are simple ways that you can rely on to avoid insomnia. Here are some few tips

  • Don’t drink caffeine drinks before going to bed
  • Don’t drink any alcohol
  • Avoid going over your do-to-list before going to bed
  • Learn to quiet yourself an hour or so before lying on the bed
  • You might also want to consider different forms of meditation

If the simple techniques above don’t work you might want to see a professional psychologist to help you out. Drugs should be the last alternative, they tend to alter the physiology of your body to make you sleep.

Insomnia is usually a sign that something somewhere in your life is wrong. You might want to attend that problem and solve it as soon as possible then everything will go back to normal. Do not allow your body to remain stressed. Heart attacks and strokes are always at the corner.