If you have trouble sleeping at night, you may be more than just disappointed and tired: As the study showed, middle-aged and older people with insomnia are more likely to be hospitalized and are more likely to seek home health care.
Prevention of insomnia in this group of people can reduce their access to medical services from 6% to 14%, according to American researchers. Scientists have statistics on the manifestation of insomnia, and it turned out that medical services are addressed among almost 14,400 middle-aged and elderly people. They found that more than 40 percent of the study participants had at least one of the symptoms of insomnia, such as trouble falling asleep, waking up at night, and previously waking up and having trouble falling asleep again. Scientists said they found, over two years, a significant association between insomnia symptoms and access to expensive medical services such as hospitalization and home health services.
“These results suggest that treatment and monitoring of insomnia in middle-aged and older people will reduce the use of health services and, apparently, reduce the number of people with poor health status,” said study principal Christopher Kaufman. Insomnia is the most common sleep problem at any age and affects nearly half of people over 60, according to the US National Institute of Health. People with insomnia, whose sleep is often short-lived, often complain of poor health in the morning.