Don't Sleep? You Can Get Cancer
Yet one more reason to feel stressed about not sleeping. It can give you cancer. Poor-quality sleep marked by frequent awakenings can speed cancer growth, increase tumor aggressiveness and dampen the immune system’s ability to control or eradicate early cancers, according to a new study, as reported by newswise.com. The Web site notes that the study is the first to demonstrate, in an animal model, "the direct effects of fragmented sleep on tumor growth and invasiveness, and it points to a biological mechanism that could serve as a potential target for therapy." “It’s not the tumor, it’s the immune system,” said study director David Gozal, MD, chairman of pediatrics at the University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital, at newswise.com. “Fragmented sleep changes how the immune system deals with cancer in ways that make the disease more aggressive.” He adds, "(The gene) appears to be a lynchpin for the cancer-promoting effects of sleep loss. The effects of fra...