Key Takeaways
- Research shows a connection between poor sleep and severe health consequences like stroke or heart disease.
- Short-term fixes like catching up on sleep on the weekends can only work to a degree. Lower your risk by getting quality sleep consistently.
- If you’re having trouble sleeping regularly, reach out to your healthcare provider or a sleep specialist.
As the “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” mantra recedes from public discourse, more and more people are coming to understand sleep as a core element of good health with benefits metabolically, emotionally, and to their mental health.
To Sudha Tallavajhula, MD, a professor at McGovern Medical School and the medical director of the TIRR Memorial Hermann Neurological Sleep Medicine Center in Houston, the importance of quality sleep can be compared to other processes that are mandatory in order to live.
“I would look at it as [similar to] the health benefits, for example, of eating good food or drinking the right amounts of water or breathing the right kind of air, which means it’s indispensable,” Tallavajhula tells us.
What’s the Link Between Sleep and Chronic Disease?
When you’re not getting good sleep it can be difficult to show up as your best self and sleep deprivation can put you at risk for severe health consequences.
- Mental health issues: According to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, that sleep deprivation has been directly linked to severe concerns including increased rates of depression and suicidality. Alex Dimitriu, MD, a psychiatrist and the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry and Sleep Medicine, says that while the effects may not be immediately obvious to other people, the mental health impacts of poor sleep can be heavy for those experiencing them.
- Risk factor for stroke: A 2018 study found that many patients who have had a stroke also have a sleep disorder and research is ongoing to establish what the relationship between the two may be.
- Link to Alzheimer’s disease: Other studies have found that Alzheimer’s progression and development may well be linked, in part, to poor sleep.
Why Sleep Is Essential for Good Health
According to Tallavajhula, it’s not just about a few of your body’s systems that benefit from long-term and short-term sleep.
“It’s really where we not just rest, but we also revive many of the other processes that are integral to human functioning,” she says. “Memory, for example, immune system functioning, hormonal balance. When we sleep, many of these hormones reach a sort of equilibrium, and then they restart for [the] next day’s processes. I mean, name it, pretty much every cell in the body sleeps and does what it’s supposed to do during sleep.”
Sleep—and a deep commitment to rest in general—can also be vital for those with conditions like myalgic encephalomyelitis or chronic fatigue syndrome.
Why Getting Treatment for Sleep Issues Is Difficult
Because sleep quality is an issue for many people, it doesn’t mean they’re always getting the care they need. William Lu, MD, a practicing physician and medical director for digital sleep clinic Dreem Health, says that there are a variety of factors why people might not be receiving adequate sleep-related care—whether that’s cultural expectations about pushing through fatigue or a general lack of focus on the topic at the family medicine level.
He says that, in some cases, the patient may be less concerned about the data or risk factors and more focused on how a lack of sleep impacts their interpersonal relationships.
“I can tell somebody statistics about, like, ‘Hey, you have untreated sleep apnea, and 20 years later, you might have an increased risk for a heart attack or stroke.’ They might not care, right? What they really care about is, ‘Well, my wife says that she can’t sleep.’”
It’s really where we not just rest, but we also revive many of the other processes that are integral to human functioning.
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SUDHA TALLAVAJHULA, MD
Another less discussed aspect of poor sleep is how conditions like sleep apnea show up differently in women than men and how hormonal differences can change how people sleep. One example Tallavajhula gives is how pregnant people have a natural shift in their sleep patterns.
“During the third trimester of pregnancy, there is a physiologic [change] which means the body prepares you for the arrival of the child by causing you to wake up multiple times, because that’s how you’re going to need to be when the child comes in.”
Can You Really Catch Up on Sleep?
It’s a popular concept that you can get away with a few hours of sleep and catch up at a later time. But is it real or just a tale to make us (the chronically sleep-deprived) feel better?
Well, it may work, to a point. Those hours you’re losing are commonly known as sleep debt and can accrue, just like an overdue credit card bill or a pesky student loan payment.
Dimitriu sees this phenomenon of so-called “catching up” as another form of procrastination.
“It’s always ‘later,’ I’ll do it later, or I’ll catch up later. And the real answer is it kind of needs to be happening, and a priority, every day. The data on catching up sleep, sure, we can catch up to some degree, but it’s really not the same, and it doesn’t really replace getting a good night of sleep every night.”
Lu sees that dynamic changing in some areas of our online culture, from the badge of honor that used to come from announcing how little sleep you can get to still function, to being awarded for having good metrics when it comes to your sleep.
“[People] want to feel better, they want to live longer,” says Lu. “They want to live healthier lives, right? And I think sleep is just now starting to get its time in the spotlight.”
How to Lower Your Risk and Get Better Sleep
Getting better sleep can come down to two key factors. Sleep architecture and sleep hygiene.
- Sleep architecture: This refers to the way you sleep physiologically and the cycles your body goes through. For example, if you suspect you have a sleep disorder, a sleep specialist may use tests to monitor your sleep patterns over the course of a night, and the depth of your sleep throughout each stage.
- Sleep hygiene: These are the routines and actions you take to improve your sleep. Some common examples include not ingesting caffeine later in the day, reducing the use of screen-based devices as your day winds down, and going to bed at a consistent time each night.
There is no magical formula for getting the seven to nine hours of sleep ideal for most people—more so for children—but these techniques can be a start.
For Dimitriu, it’s important to point out to patients that there is no quick fix or standard solution to sleep problems and that if a lack of sleep is impairing their lives, they should seek treatment.
“Everybody wants to take a supplement, not a medication,” Dimitriu explains. “Everybody wants some kind of hack that’s going to fix it… I’ve seen people suffering for 5, 10, 20 years, and there comes a time to…seek professional help at that point, ideally, sooner.”
Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Sleep deprivation and deficiency – how sleep affects your health.
Koo DL, Nam H, Thomas RJ, Yun CH. Sleep disturbances as a risk factor for stroke. Journal of Stroke. 2018;20(1):12.
Pathmanathan J, Westover MB, Sivakumaran S, Donoghue J, Puryear CB. The role of sleep in Alzheimer’s disease: a mini review. Frontiers in Neuroscience. 2025;19:1428733.
Leger D, Richard JB, Collin O, Sauvet F, Faraut B. Napping and weekend catchup sleep do not fully compensate for high rates of sleep debt and short sleep at a population level (In a representative nationwide sample of 12,637 adults). Sleep Med. 2020;74:278-288.
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