The team says the discovery "reframes a simple, highly accessible habit ... into a powerful metabolic lever."
We’d never tell you to “get more sleep,” because no one’s missing out by choice. That said, a new Stanford study has found there’s another sleep behavior that impacts type 2 diabetes risk, perhaps even more than was previously understood.
Increasingly, research is demonstrating an inextricable connection between sleep habits and metabolic health. Just as an example, 2008 research spoke to the link between sleep and weight management, body mass index, appetite regulation, and glucose (blood sugar) levels. Those researchers also noted that “the increase in the prevalence of obesity and diabetes appears to be mirrored by a decrease in average sleep duration in the U.S.”
Our sleep habits have only taken a bigger hit since then, as was an ongoing trend brought to light by the pandemic. Recently, Stanford University’s Snyder Lab teamed up with the biometric wearable ring, Ultrahuman. Their study, which included 5,859 participants, suggests further investigation is warranted for a metric they report is just as vital as sleep duration: sleep consistency.
Relying on user data spanning 100 countries and 227,860 nights of sleep, the research—which currently awaiting its peer-review process—analyzed sleep architecture data using Ultrahuman’s continuous glucose monitor, a device commonly referred to as a “CGM.”
The team reports that night-over-night, a difference of 10% to 15% “sleep timing variability” separated users with elite, athlete-level glucose control from those nearing pre-diabetes. Irregular sleep was associated with an average overnight glucose increase of 6.4 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) while time spent within a healthy glucose range decreased by 13.9%.
They also report that cardiovascular metrics mirrored similarly concerning patterns: sleep heart rate ran nine beats per minute higher, signaling the heart had to work that much harder to move blood throughout the body. Heart rate variability dropped—a measure that demonstrates the heart’s adaptability to changes in activity. “It’s a constellation of signals associated with a body under stress,” a spokesperson for the researchers notes.
It’s worth highlighting that the individuals displaying the most severe patterns had not been diagnosed as pre-diabetic. Even so, their overnight physiology was telling a different story, tracking toward pre-diabetic territory—all evidently affected by the regularity of when they went to bed.
So even when it’s tough to get more sleep, better metabolic health could result from simply following a grown-up bedtime.
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