Too Much Sleep Can be Bad for Your Health | Premier Health (2024)

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Too Much Sleep Can be Bad for Your Health | Premier Health? ›

Oversleep can result in alterations in hunger hormones, potentially causing individuals to feel more famished and consume more food. Weight gain can in turn increase the risk of diabetes. Heart disease: Too much sleep has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease, even in people who are otherwise healthy.

Sleeping too much puts you at greater risk of coronary heart disease, stroke and diabetes than sleeping too little. If you wake up feeling exhausted, see your doctor. He or she may refer you to a sleep specialist to diagnose your specific problem and begin a course of treatment.

“While consistently getting less than the recommended amount of sleep has been associated with multiple adverse health outcomes, sleeping more than nine hours per night regularly may also be detrimental,” Makekau says. She says oversleeping can lead to: Increased fatigue and low energy. Decrease in immune function.

Likewise, those who get too much sleep – more than an average nine hours per night – face higher risks for high blood pressure, stroke, Type 2 diabetes and death.

Laying in bed can help conserve energy and promote healing. However, prolonged bed rest can also lead to complications such as muscle atrophy, reduced lung capacity, and decreased blood circulation.

Too Much of a Good Thing? Sleep needs vary, but on average, regularly sleeping more than 9 hours a night may do more harm than good. Research found that people who slept longer had more calcium buildup in their heart arteries and less flexible leg arteries, too.

Oversleeping varies by age and individual needs, but sleeping much more than 9 hours a night for adults may be considered excessive. School-aged kids and teens need more slumber, so their oversleeping threshold would be higher. If you're concerned about persistent oversleeping, check in with your doc.

Too little or too much sleep can affect general health and contribute to eye problems. As mentioned above, extended periods of lying down can increase pressure on the optic nerve and contribute to the development of glaucoma. Yet too little sleep causes fatigue and has been associated with field vision loss.

What deficiency causes too much sleep? ›

What deficiency causes excessive sleepiness? Low blood levels of iron and vitamin B complex may sometimes lead to excessive sleepiness and fatigue.

About excessive sleepiness

This may be due to shiftwork, family demands (such as a new baby), study or social life. Other causes include sleep disorders, medication, and medical and psychiatric illnesses. Hypersomnia can be helped or cured with a few adjustments to lifestyle habits.

Some ways to help you get up and going after oversleeping include drinking water, doing yoga, eating food, splashing water in your face, and getting physical activity.

Oversleep can result in alterations in hunger hormones, potentially causing individuals to feel more famished and consume more food. Weight gain can in turn increase the risk of diabetes. Heart disease: Too much sleep has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease, even in people who are otherwise healthy.

What's the best sleeping position for your heart? A person's sleeping position isn't considered to be a risk factor for heart disease or other cardiovascular problems. While studies show people with heart failure often avoid sleeping on their left side, there's no evidence this sleeping position causes heart problems.

As your heart works overtime, it can cause tiredness, shortness of breath and a feeling of being simply worn out. Such are the signs of fatigue, one of the most common symptoms of congestive heart failure.

Staying in bed all day every once in a while isn't going to do much harm. Rechtman adds that although a bed can feel like a safe oasis, it's important that you only associate your bed with sleep. Staying in bed too long can lead to sleep difficulties.

Staying in bed all day by choice — what's known as bed rotting — may allow you to recharge, but too much time in bed can disrupt your mood and increase stress, experts say.

Naps for adults should be no more than an hour and probably best kept to the 15- to 20-minute range. Anything beyond that – especially considering the time of day – could have consequences. We caught up with sleep medicine specialist Nancy Foldvary-Schaefer, DO, MS, for more insight on how long your nap should be.

Hypersomnia is what doctors call a variety of conditions in which you often feel overly tired or sleep too much. It can happen because of illnesses like epilepsy or Parkinson's disease, or mental conditions like depression. It's also the main symptom of narcolepsy and of a condition called Kleine-Levin syndrome.