Poor sleep may reduce the effectiveness of vaccines, according to a study.
"With the emergence of our 24-hour lifestyle, longer working hours and the rise in the use of technology, chronic sleep deprivation has become a way of life for many Americans," Aric Prather, PhD, the study’s lead author, said in a news release.
"These findings should help raise awareness in the public health community about the clear connection between sleep and health," added Prather, a University of Pittsburgh doctoral student at the time of the study and currently a clinical health psychologist and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholar at the University of California, San Francisco, and UC Berkley,
Research has shown that poor sleep can make one susceptible to illnesses such as upper respiratory infections, according to background information in the study, which appears in the August issue of the journal Sleep. To explore whether sleep duration, sleep efficiency and sleep quality — assessed at home and not in a controlled sleep lab — would affect immune processes important in the protection against infection, the researchers investigated the antibody response to hepatitis B vaccinations in adults in good health.
The study involved 125 people (70 women, 55 men) between the ages of 40 and 60. All were nonsmokers in relatively good health, and all lived in Pennsylvania. Each participant was administered the standard three-dose hepatitis B vaccine, with the first and second dose administered a month apart and a booster dose administered at six months.
Antibody levels were measured before the second and third injections and six months after the final vaccination to determine whether participants had mounted a "clinically protective response." All the participants completed sleep diaries detailing their bedtime, wake time and sleep quality, while 88 subjects also wore electronic sleep monitors known as actigraphs.
The researchers found that people who slept fewer than six hours per night on average were far less likely to mount antibody responses to the vaccine and were 11.5 times more likely to be unprotected by the vaccine than people who slept more than seven hours on average. Sleep quality did not affect response to vaccinations.
Of the 125 participants, 18 did not receive adequate protection from the vaccine. "Sleeping fewer than six hours conferred a significant risk of being unprotected as compared with sleeping more than seven hours per night," the researchers wrote.
The researchers stressed that sleep plays an important role in the regulation of the immune system. A lack of sleep, they said, may have detrimental effects on the immune system that are integral to vaccine response.
"Based on our findings and existing laboratory evidence, sleep may belong on the list of behavioral risk factors that influence vaccination efficacy," said Prather, who in September will join the UCSF faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry.
"While there is more work to be done in this area, in time physicians and other healthcare professionals who administer vaccines may want to consider asking their patients about sleep patterns, since lack of sleep may significantly affect the potency of the vaccination."
To read the study abstract and access the study via subscription or purchase, visit http://bit.ly/Mj9dzW.
"With the emergence of our 24-hour lifestyle, longer working hours and the rise in the use of technology, chronic sleep deprivation has become a way of life for many Americans," Aric Prather, PhD, the study’s lead author, said in a news release.
"These findings should help raise awareness in the public health community about the clear connection between sleep and health," added Prather, a University of Pittsburgh doctoral student at the time of the study and currently a clinical health psychologist and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholar at the University of California, San Francisco, and UC Berkley,
Research has shown that poor sleep can make one susceptible to illnesses such as upper respiratory infections, according to background information in the study, which appears in the August issue of the journal Sleep. To explore whether sleep duration, sleep efficiency and sleep quality — assessed at home and not in a controlled sleep lab — would affect immune processes important in the protection against infection, the researchers investigated the antibody response to hepatitis B vaccinations in adults in good health.
The study involved 125 people (70 women, 55 men) between the ages of 40 and 60. All were nonsmokers in relatively good health, and all lived in Pennsylvania. Each participant was administered the standard three-dose hepatitis B vaccine, with the first and second dose administered a month apart and a booster dose administered at six months.
Antibody levels were measured before the second and third injections and six months after the final vaccination to determine whether participants had mounted a "clinically protective response." All the participants completed sleep diaries detailing their bedtime, wake time and sleep quality, while 88 subjects also wore electronic sleep monitors known as actigraphs.
The researchers found that people who slept fewer than six hours per night on average were far less likely to mount antibody responses to the vaccine and were 11.5 times more likely to be unprotected by the vaccine than people who slept more than seven hours on average. Sleep quality did not affect response to vaccinations.
Of the 125 participants, 18 did not receive adequate protection from the vaccine. "Sleeping fewer than six hours conferred a significant risk of being unprotected as compared with sleeping more than seven hours per night," the researchers wrote.
The researchers stressed that sleep plays an important role in the regulation of the immune system. A lack of sleep, they said, may have detrimental effects on the immune system that are integral to vaccine response.
"Based on our findings and existing laboratory evidence, sleep may belong on the list of behavioral risk factors that influence vaccination efficacy," said Prather, who in September will join the UCSF faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry.
"While there is more work to be done in this area, in time physicians and other healthcare professionals who administer vaccines may want to consider asking their patients about sleep patterns, since lack of sleep may significantly affect the potency of the vaccination."
To read the study abstract and access the study via subscription or purchase, visit http://bit.ly/Mj9dzW.
Send comments to editor@nurse.com or post comments below.
