Column: Dr's Casebook" Dr Keith Souter: Eating more fresh fruit and vegetables might improve your sleep
Getting enough satisfying sleep is one of the best things that you can do for your health. It is well known that if you don’t get enough good sleep then it can have a deleterious effect on your mental wellbeing, your immune system and cardiovascular health.
A research study in Finland recently found that people who consumed fewer fruits or vegetables per day either slept less or actually got an excessive amount of less satisfying sleep.
It is recommended that adults between 18 and 60 years should try to get at least seven hours sleep a night, but about thirty per cent of people get less. During good sleep the body repairs cells, balances hormones, rests the brain and stores memory. You can see the importance.
This study of over five thousand adults from Helsinki looked at how total sleep duration might influence dietary choices, especially consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables. They found that people who ate around 460 grams of fruits and vegetables a day were more likely to get an ideal amount of rest than those who ate fewer of these foods. Quite surprisingly, they found that those who consumed less than this had either insufficient or excessively long sleep patterns.
The World Health Organisation recommends that you take five servings of fruit and vegetables a day, or 400 grams of fruit. So, the 460 grams is about having six servings.
The researchers divide people into three sleeping patterns according to how long they slept at night. First, about twenty per cent were short sleepers who slept an average of six hours per night. Second, seventy-five per cent were normal sleepers who slept seven to nine hours per night and lastly, five per cent were long sleepers, who slept longer than ten hours a night.
Interestingly, they found that normal sleepers consumed the average of 460 gams per day, whereas short sleepers consumed on average almost 40 grams less, and long sleepers about 80 grams less.
This doesn’t mean that eating less fruit and vegetables causes less satisfying sleep, but it does suggest an association between food choices and sleep duration. For example, if you sleep well you may have more energy and make better diet choices, such as going for the fruit bowl than easier to obtain processed foods. But it just might mean that eating more fruit and vegetables gives you better sleep.