People who have disrupted sleep are more susceptible to pain according to research. A study was conducted on thirty two healthy women; some of them were allowed to sleep only for a few hours without any disruption and others were allowed to sleep with frequent disruptions.
It was found that women who had disrupted sleep showed a change in their pain perception and reported having more aches and pains on the days following their sleep-disrupted nights. The natural pain inhibition appeared to be dysfunctional when the study participants were subjected to forced awakenings.
Sleep disruptions may affect the body’s opioid system, which helps regulate pain perception. In doing so, fragmented sleep might contribute to or worsen the chronic pain of people with fibromyalgia or lower back problems says lead researcher Dr. Michael T. Smith, of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
What this means is that people who with chronic back pains are likely to experience more pain if they are having disrupted sleep and therefore should consider seeking therapy for their sleep problems also. If the patients can have uninterrupted sleep even if it’s for a few hours, they are likely to suffer less.
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