March 14, 2023 – Do you need to achieve maximum protection through vaccinations? Then it’s best to sleep no less than 7 hours before and after the vaccination, as a latest study recommends.
Compared to individuals who slept no less than 7 hours, individuals who slept lower than 6 hours in the times surrounding a vaccination produced significantly fewer antibodies that recognize and kill viruses and bacteria within the body.
Because the effectiveness of many vaccines wanes over time, the booster essentially makes the protection from the vaccine last more — by as much as two months, the researchers found.
“Good sleep not only enhances the protective effect of the vaccine, but can also prolong it,” said researcher Eve Van Cauter, PhD, professor emeritus on the University of Chicago, in a opinion.
The study, which was published on Monday in Current Biologyre-analyzed previous research on the link between sleep and the effectiveness of vaccines against flu and hepatitis. The researchers sought to know the connection because there was evidence that individuals developed different levels of immunity after receiving the identical COVID-19 vaccines. Sleep studies specifically on COVID vaccines should not yet available, so the researchers decided to judge existing studies and extrapolate those findings to what is understood about COVID vaccines.
“The way we stimulate the immune system is the same whether we use an mRNA vaccine for COVID-19 or a flu, hepatitis, typhoid or pneumococcal vaccine. It's a prototypical antibody or vaccine response, and that's why we think we can generalize it to COVID,” said researcher Michael Irwin, MD, a UCLA expert who focuses on the connection between psychological processes, the nervous system and immunity. CNN.
When researchers checked out vaccine response in several groups, the results of sleep were biggest in men and in people ages 18 to 60. Researchers said more research is required on the results in women because fluctuations of their hormone levels affect the immune system.
They also found that the vaccine's effectiveness was not as affected by lack of sleep in people aged 65 and over. The authors suspect that it’s because older people sleep lower than younger people anyway.
The findings are necessary because they provide people a possibility to alter their very own behavior to enhance their health and immunity, Van Cauter said.
“If you look at the differential protective effects of the COVID-19 vaccines, you see that people with underlying health conditions are less protected, men are less protected than women, and obese people are less protected than people without obesity,” she said. “These are all factors that are beyond the control of the individual, but you can influence your sleep.”