The consequences of not getting enough shut-eye may be more serious than you think, especially if you're African American, a study published this week in the American Journal of Epidemiology shows.


Previous research has linked poor sleep habits -- a risk factor that's more likely to occur among professional and management-level African-American adults -- to weight gain, low libido and less attractive facial features[1] , but according to this latest report, insufficient sleep may even kill you.


Read more on what researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health found, and more notes on the black health chart this week.



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  • Blacks Are At Higher Risk For Health Problems From Insufficient Sleep


    Analyzing data from nearly 137,000 American adults between 2004 and 2011, Harvard School of Public Health researchers found that 30 percent of them were short sleepers (getting less than seven hours of sleep a night), 31 percent were optimal sleepers (getting about seven hours of sleep a night), and 39 percent were long sleepers (getting more than seven hours of sleep a night). Further analysis revealed that <a href="http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/newsplus/blacks-in-u-s-may-be-at-higher-risk-for-health-problems-from-insufficient-sleep/" target="_blank">37 percent of black participants were short sleepers, compared with 28 percent of whites</a>. Among the shortest sleepers? Those working in professional or management positions, researchers noted, pointing to possible sleep-disrupting factors that affect blacks more than whites, including job strain; discrimination or harassment in the workplace, which can increase stress; limited control over job demands or prestige; limited professional and social networks providing emotional or financial support; long work hours; and greater home stress. It's also possible that a high work ethic among blacks could lead to stress, disrupted sleep, and negative health effects, the researchers wrote, referring to a phenomenon known as "John Henryism," a coping strategy in which individuals, beset by stress and social discrimination, expend enormous effort to achieve success, despite possibly damaging their health in the process. The health outcomes of "short sleep" remain consistent with what previous research has shown, including obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, and even death.




  • AIDS Vaccine Appears To Completely Clear Virus From The Body In Monkeys


    Though it's only been tested so far in a non-human primate form of HIV, called simian immunodeficiency virus, or SIV, which causes AIDS in monkeys, an HIV/AIDS vaccine developed by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University appears to have the ability to <a href="http://www.ohsu.edu/xd/about/news_events/news/2013/09-11-ohsu-vaccine-candidate-a.cfm" target="_blank">completely clear an AIDS-causing virus from the body</a>. The research, published online Wednesday by the journal Nature, found that 50 percent of monkeys given highly pathogenic SIV after being vaccinated with this vaccine became infected with SIV, but over time eliminated all trace of SIV from the body. Study researchers said that they are hopeful their findings will lead to a similar result in humans.




  • Blood Pressure Problems May Be In Your Genes


    In a study involving nearly 30,000 African Americans, researchers at Case Western Reserve University found that a set of four common genetic mutations may make African Americans more susceptible to hypertension compared to individuals of other ancestries. "In addition to their disproportionate suffering, hypertension occurs earlier in life for African-Americans," study co-author Xiaofeng Zhu, PhD noted. Experts estimate genetic make-up accounts for roughly 40-50 percent of individuals' susceptibility to hypertension. But the new findings do not have immediate implications for treatment, researchers added, detailing a second phase of their study, which will determine whether the newly identified genes respond to existing hypertension medications. Individuals typically respond differently to a given medication depending on which gene mutation they carry.




  • Commercial Insurance Triples Chances Of Breast Cancer Survival


    With breast cancer survival relying on both internal and external factors, such as socioeconomic status, researchers at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center in Shreveport, Louisiana set out to explore the relationship between insurance status and overall survival of 987 female breast cancer patients (54.6 percent of whom were African-American) in a population served by a public hospital. 54.1 percent of patients were insured with either commercial insurance or Medicare; 27.1 percent had Medicaid; and 18.8 percent were uninsured. All patients were offered the same level of care regardless of ability to pay. What they found: <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tbj.12185/abstract" target="_blank">Uninsured patients had worse overall survival rates compared with insured patients</a> with survival times ranging from 15.8 years, 11.3 years, and 8.2 years for insured, Medicaid, and uninsured groups, respectively. "Even in a public hospital, after adjusting for potential risk factors, insurance status still proved to be an important factor in the survival of breast cancer patients," the study authors wrote, adding that further research is needed to determine the cause of these survival disparities.