Sleep Expert Corner

How Much Sleep Do We Need?

Sleep needs change as we age, with the average person generally requiring less sleep at older ages. However, specific sleep amounts vary by individual. According to the National Sleep Foundation and American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM), newborns need the most sleep, at 14-17 hours a day, followed by infants at 12-16 hours a day including naps. Toddlers need about 10-14 hours a day. Preteens and teenagers need about 8-12 hours a night, and adults about 7-8 hours a day. [29]

A consensus by the AASM and Sleep Research Society recommends that adults should sleep 7 or more hours a night to promote optimal health. [30] The report notes that sleeping fewer hours is associated with weight gain, obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, increased risk of death, impaired immune function, increased pain, impaired performance, and greater risk of accidents. The report also notes that regularly sleeping more than 9 hours a night has unclear risk or benefit for the average person, but may be appropriate for people of younger ages or those who are ill.

Other factors such as quality of sleep are important, because just meeting the total recommended sleep hours may not be enough if one wakes up frequently in the night. A common belief is that lost sleep from a late night out or studying can be recovered by “sleeping in” another day or taking naps. However, both of these methods disrupt the body’s circadian rhythms and may deprive the body of deeper sleep stages. In fact, increased variability in how much sleep we get from night to night is associated with an increased risk of developing metabolic and heart diseases. [31] It is important to respond, whenever possible, to the body’s natural signals of sleepiness.

Sources:

1. Paruthi S, Brooks LJ, D’Ambrosio C, Hall WA, Kotagal S, Lloyd RM, Malow BA, Maski K, Nichols C, Quan SF, Rosen CL. Consensus statement of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine on the recommended amount of sleep for healthy children: methodology and discussion. Journal of clinical sleep medicine. 2016 Nov 15;12(11):1549-61.
2. Consensus Conference Panel, Watson NF, Badr MS, Belenky G, Bliwise DL, Buxton OM, Buysse D, Dinges DF, Gangwisch J, Grandner MA, Kushida C. Recommended amount of sleep for a healthy adult: a joint consensus statement of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and Sleep Research Society. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine. 2015 Jun 15;11(6):591-2.
3. Huang T, Redline S. Cross-sectional and prospective associations of actigraphy-assessed sleep regularity with metabolic abnormalities: the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis. Diabetes Care. 2019 Aug 1;42(8):1422-9.