Poor sleep is known to raise diabetic complications, but can too much sleep also be harmful? Researchers say that for diabetes patients, both insufficient and excessive sleep may lead to damage to small blood vessels.

Microvascular complications are common long-term issues associated with diabetes, impacting small blood vessels. These complications typically include retinopathy (damage to the eye's blood vessels), nephropathy (damage to the kidney's blood vessels), and neuropathy (nerve damage).

In a new study, researchers explored the link between sleep duration and microvascular disease in individuals newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. They found that short sleep duration is tied to a 2.6 times higher risk of microvascular disease, while long sleep duration is linked to a 2.3 times increased risk of the same condition.

The researchers monitored the sleep duration of approximately 400 individuals with type 2 diabetes. They defined short sleep as less than seven hours and long sleep as nine hours or more. They noted that around 12% of the patients experienced short sleep, while 28% had long sleep on average.

The study revealed that 38% of those with short sleep and 31% of those with long sleep showed signs of small blood vessel damage, underscoring the significant impact of both insufficient and excessive sleep on vascular health in diabetics.

They further observed that the risk of microvascular complications escalates with age. For instance, individuals with diabetes over the age of 62 who experience short sleep have a 5.7 times higher risk of developing small blood vessel disease.

"In recently diagnosed T2DM patients, both short and long sleep durations are associated with a higher prevalence of microvascular disease compared to optimal sleep duration at night. Age amplifies the association between short sleep duration and microvascular disease, suggesting increased vulnerability among older individuals," the researchers wrote.

The study's findings will be presented at this year's Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes, set to take place in Madrid this September.

The researchers caution that findings should be considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal, and more research is required to understand the effects of poor sleep on diabetics.

"Lifestyle changes in patients with type 2 diabetes may include sleep interventions. However, further studies are needed to establish the role of sleep duration and quality in these patients," they added.

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