Cheeky study reveals too much sleep beyond 8hrs 'could cause a stroke'

Sleeping for longer than eight hours a day can double your risk of a stroke, scientists have discovered.

Experts at the University of Cambridge suggested the findings from their 10-year study of 10,000 people could save lives and slash healthcare costs. Every year there are more than 150,000 strokes in the UK.

It is the equivalent of one every three and a half minutes and around one in every four people who suffer a stroke will die.

A stroke is a serious, life-threatening medical condition which happens when the blood supply to part of the brain is cut off. It is Britain’s third biggest killer, behind heart disease and cancer.

Researchers began collecting data in 1998 by asking people aged between 42 and 81 how long they slept on an average day. They checked their sleeping patterns four years later and then six years after that.

The study found that those who said they slept more than eight hours a night at both points of the study were twice as likely to suffer a stroke. And people who went from sleeping less than six hours a night to more than eight hours were four times as likely to have a stroke.

It is not known why there is an increased risk of stroke if you you sleep too long. Importantly, the study only found an association between sleep length and risk of stroke. It did not find that sleeping for too long actually causes stroke.

...DailyMirror