How Much Sleep Do You Really Need?

It is common knowledge that you need 8 hours of sleep each night, but an expert panel is now changing this longstanding recommendation, a new study says.

The panel, convened by the National Sleep Foundation, is making its new suggestions based on age, ranging from newborns (who need 14 to 17 hours of sleep per day) to adults aged 65 and up (7 to 8 hours per day).

In the new guidelines, there's a wider range of what constitutes a good night's sleep. For example, the panel recommends that teens, aged 14 to 17, get 8 to 10 hours of sleep per night - that's opposed to the previous range of 8.5 to 9.5 hours per night.

Before the panel released their new recommendations, they examined findings from 320 prior studies reporting sleep duration findings for healthy individuals. The studies also determined the effects of reduced or prolonged sleep duration, and health consequences of too much or too little sleep.

They reported their findings in Sleep Health: Journal of the National Sleep Foundation.

"The process was very rigorous," Dr. Lydia DonCarlos, a researcher at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine, said in a statement.

These less narrow guidelines in no way diminish the importance of sleep. While sleep may be considered a "passive" part of our lives, it's crucial to our health and helps to prevent chronic diseases.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), insufficient sleep is associated with diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity, and depression. However, despite its known importance, more than 25 percent of the US population doesn't get enough sleep, while 10 percent suffer from chronic insomnia (lack of sleep).

Sleep is governed by hormones in the brain region called the hypothalamus, which control our circadian rhythm, or internal body clock.

"We still have a great deal to learn about the function of sleep," Dr. DonCarlos added. "We know it's restorative and important for memory consolidation. But we don't know the details of what the function of sleep is, even though it is how we spend one-third of our lives."

So with these findings, researchers hope that those who often don't get enough sleep can adhere to the new recommendations, because sleep is vital to our well being. And for those who still struggle, remember the power of the power nap.

For more great nature science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).