Novel evidence links sleep deficiency, dementia, and mortality.

A new study included 2,812 adults, 65 years of age and older, from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS). The study subjects completed surveys about sleep disturbance and duration in 2013 and 2014. Investigators assessed the link between sleep disturbance and deficiency and incident dementia and all-cause mortality over a period of 5 years. Fully adjusted Cox multivariate analysis revealed that subjects who slept 5 hours or less per night had about double the risk for incident dementia compared to those who slept longer (hazard ratio, 2.04). The risk of dementia was found to be higher among those who took 30 minutes or longer to fall asleep (HR, 1.45). The findings are published in Aging… (Medscape)