An early night could reduce asthma symptoms in teenagers, say researchers

Getting an early night could reduce asthma symptoms, as teenagers who stay up late are three times more likely to suffer, a new study has shown.

Scientists found that night owls who sleep and rise later in the day are more likely to suffer from both asthma and hay fever.

While breathing difficulties are strongly linked to your internal body clock, this is the first time that researchers have looked at how it relates to people’s sleeping preferences.

"Our results suggest there's a link between preferred sleep time, and asthma and allergies in teenagers,” said the study’s author Dr Subhabrata Moitra, of the University of Alberta in Canada.

"We can't be certain that staying up late is causing asthma, but we know that the sleep hormone melatonin is often out of sync in late-sleepers and that could, in turn, be influencing teenagers' allergic response.

"Asthma and allergic diseases are common in children and adolescents across the world and the prevalence is increasing. "

Writing in the ERJ Open Research journal, the research team surveyed 1,700 teenagers between 13 and 14-years old from West Bengal in India.

Through a series of questions they were able to divide the young people into three categories: evening types, morning types and inbetweeners.

The researchers did not reveal the bedtimes which would classify the teenagers as a morning or evening type person.

When they compared these results with symptoms of breathing difficulties, they found that those who preferred to sleep late were three times as likely to have asthma, and twice as likely to have hay fever.

Around 5.5 million people in the UK have asthma, one of the highest rates in Europe, while the UK’s average bedtime is approximately half-past-midnight.

Professor Thierry Troosters, President of the European Respiratory Society said: "We need to know much more about why asthma and allergies are rising in children and teenagers and, hopefully, find ways to reduce these conditions.

"This is the first study to examine the possible role of different sleep preferences in teenagers' risk of asthma and allergies, and it opens up an interesting and important new line of research.

"We already know that sleeping well is important for physical and mental health, so we should continue to encourage teenagers to get a good night's sleep.”