Sleep efficiency tied to 24-h BPV, but not duration, quality

Adults with elevated blood pressure (BP) who have better sleep efficiency tend to show lower short-term BP variability (BPV), reveals a study. However, longer sleep duration and perceived sleep quality appear to have no significant association with BPV.

Two hundred adults (mean age 42 years) participated in this study. Higher sleep efficiency significantly correlated with lower systolic and diastolic BPV (p<0.05). On the other hand, total sleep time (TST) and subjective sleep measures showed no independent association with BPV.

Furthermore, hourly BPV profiles demonstrated peak variability in the early morning or late afternoon.

“Interventions improving sleep efficiency may offer cardiovascular benefits beyond extending sleep duration,” the investigators said.

This cross-sectional baseline analyses from a behavioural sleep-extension trial involved adults 18‒65 years of age with self-reported short sleep (<7 h/night) and clinic BP 120‒150/80‒90 mm Hg who completed 7 days of wrist actigraphy and 24-h ambulatory BP monitoring.

Actigraphy-derived sleep efficiency and TST were the objective sleep measures, while subjective measures included the Insomnia Severity Index and PROMIS Sleep Disturbance and Sleep-Related Impairment scales.

The investigators calculated BPV as the average real variability of systolic and diastolic pressures. They used linear regression models, with adjustment for age, sex, and race. Further adjustment for BMI left the diastolic association significant (p=0.003) and the systolic association marginal (p=0.056).