Heart healthy sleeping

Asish Mohapatra

Disturbed sleep and lack of sleep affect your heart and circulatory system. What should be done to sleep better to keep heart healthy?

1. Go to bed and wake up always at particular time. The sleep timings and wake up timings should not differ more than 30 minutes from each other.

2. Prefer one light and protein rich dinner.one carbohydrate rich and fat rich dinner stimulate the intestinal activity and disturbs the sleep.

3. The afternoon nap should be done before 3 pm and not be more than 20 minutes long, otherwise that will affect the nighttime sleep. The person who sleeps bad at night, he/she should avoid afternoon nap.

4. Regular sleeping rituals before sleep help in a good quality of sleep. For example evening prayer ,meditation or pranayams.

5. When you are waking up in night, avoid more white lights in room and eating, as both these habits stimulate the wake up and disturb inner peace.

6. Electrical devices belong to bed:at least one hour before going to bed try not to work on computer or surf in your smartphone.

7. Avoid big meal size consume of alcohol at least 3 hours before sleep.

8. Avoid coffee at least 6-8 hours before going to bed. You should not smoke cigarettes like substances, if at all you smoke then don’t smoke after 7 pm, as nicotine disturbs sleep.

9. Sport is good. However avoid physical exertion after 7 pm because this activates the sympathetic nervous system and resulting in sleep disturbance. One evening walk is enoughto get you tired and helps in avoid quality of sleep.

10. You should take sleeping pill only with the doctor’s advice

11. The bedroom should be peaceful and dark and should have a pleasant temperature. Fresh air through a opened window takes care of better sleep .

Sufficient amount of good sleep is not only the precondition for our efficiency for our well-being and for physical health, but also for the mental health it is equally important.

It worth doing something for good sleep; we spend around one third of our life span in sleeping, then it is too much to sleep badly.

The heart takes care of our body nonstop; so it’s our duty to keep the heart healthy by adopting few good habits to promote good quality sleep.

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The writer is a senior consultant interventional and structural cardiology, Germany