{"id":599306,"date":"2026-04-22T09:21:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T09:21:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/599306\/"},"modified":"2026-04-22T09:21:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T09:21:11","slug":"excessive-daytime-napping-linked-to-higher-risk-of-death-in-older-adults-study-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/599306\/","title":{"rendered":"Excessive daytime napping linked to higher risk of death in older adults, study finds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\nPeople who love to nap may be alarmed to hear that dozing off during the day is linked to an increased risk of death, according to a new study.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nWhile short naps have been <a href=\"https:\/\/www.phillyvoice.com\/napping-tips-health-benefits-downsides\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">shown<\/a> to be restorative, other research has found that excessive napping is associated with higher risk of long-term health issues, including <a data-original-title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/oby.23765?__cf_chl_tk=5VE_JpD_ZTOvSKfnVzK06VBbvabu2qGs5ZT3sF3llQw-1776781057-1.0.1.1-degu5D25c5_wZ.sXTPmHP_t17ZAf1EY3T7Gwg2.uDDM\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">obesity<\/a>, <a data-original-title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hcplive.com\/view\/longer-midday-naps-linked-to-increased-risk-of-metabolic-syndrome\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">metabolic syndrome<\/a> and death from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/abs\/pii\/S1087079224000935\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">any cause<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n<p>MORE:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.phillyvoice.com\/pennsylvania-abortion-court-medicaid-ban-struck-down\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Pa. court strikes down state ban on using Medicaid for abortions<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\nThe new study, published Monday in <a data-original-title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/jamanetwork.com\/journals\/jamanetworkopen\/fullarticle\/2847953?guestAccessKey=f9dae5c2-3037-4a1c-80f3-92473893f881\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">JAMA Internal Medicine<\/a>, went even deeper, showing that in older adults, each extra hour of napping was linked to a 13% higher risk of death. It also found that each extra nap a day was associated with a 7% higher mortality risk and that morning napping was linked to a 30% higher risk of death.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n&#8220;Our study is one of the first to show an association between objectively measured nap patterns and mortality and suggests there is immense clinical value in tracking napping patterns to catch health conditions early,&#8221; the study&#8217;s lead author, Chenlu Gao, said in a <a data-original-title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.massgeneralbrigham.org\/en\/about\/newsroom\/press-releases\/high-mortality-rates-in-older-adults-napping-excessively\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">news release<\/a>. Gao is a researcher at Mass General Brigham&#8217;s anesthesiology department.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nGao and her colleagues used data from the <a data-original-title=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rushu.rush.edu\/research-rush-university\/departmental-research\/rush-alzheimers-disease-center\/rush-alzheimers-disease-center-research\/epidemiologic-research\/memory-aging-project\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Rush University Medical Center<\/a>&#8216;s Memory and Aging Project to track the napping patterns of more than 1,300 adults between 2005 and 2025. The participants,\u00a0ages 56 or older at the start of the study,\u00a0wore wrist monitors 10 days a year to track their daily activity, including napping between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m.<\/p>\n<p>\nThe finding that frequent daytime naps, especially in the morning, were linked to increased risk of death from any cause suggests that tracking nap patterns may help predict risk of future health problems and to intervene early, the researchers said.<\/p>\n<p>\n&#8220;Excessive napping is likely indicating underlying disease, chronic conditions, sleep disturbances, or circadian dysregulation,&#8221; Gao said. &#8220;Now that we know there is a strong correlation between napping patterns and mortality rates, we can make the case to implement wearable daytime nap assessments to predict health conditions and prevent further decline.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People who love to nap may be alarmed to hear that dozing off during the day is linked&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":599307,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[85599,8609,97,252,253,3147,260937,2085,1728,8115,48096],"class_list":{"0":"post-599306","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-care","8":"tag-adult-health","9":"tag-death","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-health-care","12":"tag-healthcare","13":"tag-mortality","14":"tag-naps","15":"tag-philadelphia","16":"tag-research","17":"tag-sleep","18":"tag-studies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}