Research news: Heart ticks a bit better after time shift

The News:
Heart ticks a bit better after time shift
The cause each fall is probably the hour of sleep we gain with the end of daylight saving time.
By Karen Kaplan Los Angeles Times
Article Last Updated: 10/29/2008 11:01:23 PM MDT
Turning your clock back one hour Sunday for the end of daylight saving time could do your own ticker some good.
Researchers have found a 5 percent drop in heart-attack deaths and hospitalizations the day after clocks are reset each year to standard time, according to a study published today in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The Swedish researchers also found that the onset of daylight saving time in the spring appears to increase the risk of heart attacks.
Physicians can now add daylight saving time to the list of everyday events that affect heart attacks, said Dr. Ralph Brindis, a vice president of the American College of Cardiology who practices in Oakland, Calif. The risk also rises on holidays and anniversaries, although no one knows why, he said.
"This study is fascinating," Brindis said.
The culprit probably is lack of sleep. Scientists have known that sleep deprivation is bad for the heart — the body responds by boosting blood pressure, heart rate and the tendency to form dangerous clots — but they didn't realize a single hour could have a measurable effect.
More than 1.5 billion people change their clocks twice a year to make the most of the available sunlight. William Willett, a British builder, proposed the idea in 1905 after watching Londoners sleep through so many perfectly good hours of morning sunshine. (He also complained that his afternoon golf games were cut short by an unnecessarily early dusk.) Read on...

The Research:
Read the research behind this story in the New England Journal of Medicine.