How Insomnia Negatively Impacts Your Health

It’s one thing to miss out on a good night’s sleep here and there, but chronic issues can leave you sleep-deprived. Whether you struggle to stay asleep, fall asleep, or sleep enough, insomnia symptoms can take a toll on your mental and physical health. 

As a board-certified psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, Kevin Joseph, DNP, PMHNP-BC, understands the crucial role quality sleep plays in a person’s overall health. He also knows that up to 80% of adults with mental health conditions experience insomnia symptoms. 

Fortunately, Dr. Joseph can help put an end to your tossing and turning at Insight Psychiatric Services P.A. in Sunrise, Florida. Do you have insomnia? See how ignoring your sleepless nights can impact your health.

The importance of sleep

Before taking a closer look and the health risks insomnia can pose, it’s important to understand why quality sleep matters in the first place.

You may think your body shuts down once you head off to dreamland. However, your system is actually hard at work performing numerous functions, such as:

• Storing new information and eliminating toxic waste in the brain
• Releasing vital molecules, such as hormones and proteins
• Repairing cells and restoring energy

This restorative process plays an essential role in your body’s ability to function. It typically occurs during four stages of sleep, and this cycle varies in length from 70-120 minutes, and it repeats several times throughout the night.

Generally speaking, most adults need 7-9 hours of sleep each night to restore, repair and re-energize the body and brain. If you regularly fall short of this, it can compromise your health.

Insomnia and your physical health

People often associate insomnia with sluggishness, slow reflexes, or problems remembering things. However, it also strains your heart and circulatory system, which increases your risk for serious complications, such as:

• High blood pressure
• Coronary heart disease
• Angina, chest pain, or heart attacks
• Stroke

On top of that, insomnia also disrupts your hormones and metabolism. What does that mean? Those sleepless nights increase your chances of being overweight and obese. 

Finally, insomnia can also cause serious problems with your respiratory and immune systems. So, not only are you more likely to get colds and infections but existing breathing problems, such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, can worsen.

Insomnia and your mental health

In addition to your physical health, insomnia can also impact your mental health. And these conditions often go hand-in-hand. To further complicate things, insomnia can lead to many mental health conditions, and many mental health conditions can cause insomnia.

Common mental health conditions associated with insomnia include:

• Depression
• Anxiety
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
• Bipolar disorder
• Schizophrenia 
• Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
• Substance use disorder (SUD)

Whether mental health symptoms triggered your insomnia or vice versa, expert care can help. However, you need to get to the bottom of your sleep troubles to find the most effective treatment.

Treating insomnia

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach for treating insomnia, especially if you also have a mental health condition. Instead, you need a targeted approach that addresses the underlying cause of your symptoms.

To start, Dr. Joseph recommends scheduling an appointment for an evaluation. If you have a psychiatric disorder, he can treat your insomnia symptoms and help you manage your mental health at the same time.

If you don’t have a psychiatric disorder, Dr. Joseph can also help you. In these cases, he can offer personal recommendations to medical or sleep medicine specialists who can address your unique needs.

Do you have insomnia? Don’t let it put your health at risk. To get the help you need, call 954-932-7500 or book an appointment online with Insight Psychiatric Services P.A. today.