Are You Getting Enough Sleep?

A new report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that an estimated 28 percent of adult Americans are receiving less than 6 hours of sleep per night. According to the health organization, this can lead to some serious mental and physical health complications.

"[Sleep is] one of the components of a three-legged stool of wellness: nutrition, exercise and sleep," said Safwan Badr, a past president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and a sleep expert with Detroit Medical Center and Wayne State University, via USA Today. "The three are synergistic. It's hard to lose weight if you are sleep deprived. It's hard to eat healthy if you are sleep deprived. It is hard to exercise if you're tired."

CDC experts predict that sleep deprivation can increase the risk for a number of serious health complications, including hypertension, heart attack, depression, obesity, type 2 diabetes and stroke. Sleep deprivation can also increase the risk of motor vehicular accidents, which can result in fatal injuries.

"One of the main hypotheses is that one primary function of sleep is to help eliminate metabolic waste products of the mental processes in your brain," said Timothy Morgenthaler, a consultant at the Mayo Clinic Center for Sleep Medicine in Rochester, Minn. "Sleep clears those waste products out and replenishes the energy inside brain cells. When we don't get enough sleep, we actually injure brain cells. The research was done in mice, but I think there is very little doubt that our cognition suffers, and our brain does not function as well when we don't get enough sleep."

Currently, the recommended number of sleep for adults per night is anywhere between 7-9 hours a night. Certain factors related to weight, age and medical conditions may also require others to need more or less sleep.

As the findings demonstrates the necessity of sleep as part of our everyday health, researchers note just how important it is that Americans make sleep more of a necessity.