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Mayo Clinic Minute: Sleep spoilers — tips for a good night’s rest
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This year, daylight saving time ends on Sunday, Nov. 4. That means you should turn your clock back one hour. The good news is that you get an extra hour to sleep if you want. The not-so-good news is that even a small, one-hour time change can disrupt your sleep schedule.
Dr. Virend Somers, a Mayo Clinic cardiologist, says sufficient, quality sleep is needed to stay healthy. He offers tips on how to get the sleep you need, even through the daylight saving time change.
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Sleep is super important to your health.
"When you don't sleep well, bad things happen," says Dr. Somers. "Sleep is very much a multidisciplinary specialty for good reason because sleep affects all the organs of the body. And not sleeping, then, is going to also affect all the organs of the body."
Poor sleep may increase your risk of conditions such as heart disease, obesity, depression and dementia. And it even affects how you look. To help you get better quality sleep, Dr. Somers offers these tips:
- Avoid alcohol and big meals before bed
- Don't exercise right before bed
- Turn off all screens, including your smartphone, an hour before bed.
“We’ve got bright lights all over the place, and then we switch the lights off, we lie in bed and expect to sleep," says Dr. Somers. "The bedroom [and] the bed [are] for sex and sleep. It's not for spreadsheets, and it's not for watching TV."
He also suggests keeping your bedroom as dark and quiet as possible ─ healthy sleep for a healthy life.
