We’re more prone to unhealthful inflammation, and more at risk for diseases, including metabolic disease, cancer, and heart disease. When circadian rhythms are disrupted, so is normal immune function. When circadian rhythms are out of sync, so is sleep.Ĭircadian rhythms also regulate our immune system, and with it, our levels of inflammation. Those daily sleep-wake cycles we move through without much thought? Our circadian rhythms are working behind the scenes to keep us on schedule.
Our sleep is regulated by circadian rhythms, which drive hormones and other physiological changes that cause us to move back and forth along a continuum of sleep and wakefulness throughout the 24-hour day. One thing we do know? Sleep, immune function, and inflammation share a common regulator. The human immune system is tremendously complex, and scientists are still working to de-code its operations, to understand how it works-and why things go wrong. Though it’s clear we need sleep to survive, scientists still don’t know why we sleep. For all our scientific inquiry to sleep, there’s a tremendous amount we don’t know. In talking about sleep and the immune system, we’re tackling two of the most complicated processes of the human body. Sleep and inflammation are regulated by the same bio rhythms And, as research shows, poor sleep is a contributor to inflammation. What triggers excessive, unhealthful, chronic inflammation? Poor diet, environmental toxins, stress. Over time, these fighter cells can attack, wear down, and cause damage to healthy cells, tissues, organs, and systems throughout the body, leading to chronic illness. With chronic inflammation, the body’s immune system is in perpetual fight mode, activating disease-fighting cells that have no external threat to fend off.
Multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, and lupus are examples of autoimmune conditions that develop in part from an excessive, misdirected inflammatory response.Ĭhronic inflammation is also linked to the development of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and cancer-the major chronic and life-threatening diseases of our time. Instead, the immune system’s pathogen-fighting cells attack the body’s own healthy cells and tissues. Autoimmune diseases occur as a result of the body triggering an inflammatory response when there is no foreign threat present. Problems with inflammation occur when this natural, protective response happens too often, or at the wrong times. But the body’s inflammatory response it essential to our health and survival. We talk a lot about the dangers associated with inflammation. The symptoms of acute inflammation, including swelling and redness, fever and chills, pain and stiffness, and fatigue, are signs the body’s immune system is in “fight mode,” working hard to neutralize a threat. Inflammation is a natural, protective biological response from the immune system to fight off harmful foreign pathogens-bacteria, viruses, toxins- that cause illness and disease, and to help the body heal from injury. In talking with my patients, I realize that while most of them understand that excessive inflammation can be harmful, many don’t have a strong understanding of what inflammation is, or what it does. Sleeping well may be one way we can guard against the unhealthful inflammation that’s associated with chronic diseases from cancer and heart disease to autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis and others. Keeping inflammation in check has big ramifications for our health. Chronic inflammation has gotten a lot of attention in recent years as a major contributor to illness and disease.īut how much do you know about the relationship between inflammation and sleep? That relationship brings together two complex and fundamental of the body’s systems-the immune system and our need for sleep.
If you pay attention to health issues, you probably hear a lot about inflammation.
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