How Oversleeping Destroys Your Body

We all know that sleep deprivation is bad for us. However, studies suggest that oversleeping might also damage our bodies? What happens if we oversleep? And how can we avoid oversleeping? 🔬 Subscribe for more awesome biomedical research: 📸 IG: 🔬Twitter: In 1963, a teenager named Randy Gardner broke the world record by staying awake for over 290 hours. William Dement, a famous sleep scientist studied how his body changed through sleep deprivation. Sleep normally involves REM and non-REM phases which help our bodies to recover. If we do not sleep (and are sleep deprived), however, our body has several issues. Neurotransmitter levels are dysregulated and we start to hallucinate, be less focused and experience other symptoms. Similar to lacking sleep, oversleeping also damages our bodies. Oversleeping or hypersomnia is characterized by the urge to sleep and symptoms such as headache or constantly being tired. Roughly 4% of people suffer from chronic oversleeping. Although oversleeping can be caused by depression, an underlying sleep disorder or other syndromes, we can also just get used to oversleep - but that is not healthy. Oversleeping is associated with a variety of diseases including heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes or Alzheimers disease. Furthermore, oversleeping is associaed with obesity, a decreased fertility and a shorter lifespan (30% higher mortality). There are several reasons for this phenomenon including chronic inflammation, an altered metabolism, or hormones or unidentified underlying diseases. Still, sleep deprivation is also detrimental. Already over 70 million people in the United states sleep to little. And this is bad. It is proposed that 20% of all injuries that result from car accidents can be associated with sleep deprivation. Similar to oversleeping, sleep deprivation is also associated several diseases including diabetes. Studies also suggest that sleep deprivation might cause lasting brain damages but there are more studies needed. If we want to sleep properly we should try to have a sleep schedule, workout during the day and avoid bright lights before we go to sleep. 0:00-0:56 Intro 0:56-4:08 Beginnings of Sleep Science 4:08-8:50 The Dangers of Oversleeping 8:50-11:17 Sleep Deprivation Makes Brain Damages 11:17-12:36 How We Should Sleep References: #1 Images: Some pictures were derived from Servier Medical Art by Servier. You can find over 3000 free medical images here: Some video clips are derived from William dement derived from Ed Souza/Stanford News Service Roger federer by Tatiana, CC BY-SA 2.0 Music: Title: Art of Silence by Uniq Title: Punch Deck by promoted by BreakingCopyright: (CC BY 3.0) Title: Black heat by Ross Budgen (CC BY 4.0) Title: Filaments by Scott Buckley d (CC BY 3.0) Title: Rudolph by Lukrembro Light Sting by Kevin MacLeod (CC By 4.0) Source: Title: Buddha by Kontekst Genre and Mood: Hip Hop & Rap Bright Artist: About Clemens Steinek: CLEMENS STEINEK is a PhD student/youtuber (Sciencerely) who is currently conducting stem cell research in Germany.