DST and Health: Are You "on shift"?

 

March 18, 2011 - The change to daylight saving time would affect our health and our vigilance. In addition to being linked to increased cardiovascular disorders , it is also associated with an increase in road accidents in the following days.
Circadian rhythms can be disturbed persons for a few days to adjust to DST. In fact, the time change may disrupt the biological clock of certain hormones in the body, including melatonin , which needs a drop in brightness of about 2 hours to induce sleep.
Therefore, lack of sleep tends to decrease alertness and rapid reflexes in individuals' daily activities, including driving their car.

Circadian rhythms Circadian rhythms refer to biological events of our organization that are repeated every 24 hours. They are generated within our bodies and they persist even in the absence of stimuli from the outside. They may however be influenced by the environment, particularly by light. These rhythms are controlled by the biological clock in the center of the brain at the base of the hypothalamus.

"It is recognized that after a time change, there may be an increased number of accidents for 1 to 3 days. This time change may cause a certain level of fatigue and lack of attention in some people. While others will suffer less, "says Nicolas Cermakian specialist circadian rhythms at the Graduate Institute of Mental Health Douglas of Montreal.
The few studies that have been published on this phenomenon in recent decades, particularly in the New England Journal of Medicine and the journal Sleep Medicine, showed a higher increase in the number of road accidents on Monday after passing the time Advanced.
In another study, published in the journal Current Biology, the authors showed that the biological clock of the human body would have more difficulty adjusting to the transition to DST on the return to Standard Time.
The time change could also have effects on mental health. An Australian study, the number of suicides is higher in the first weeks after the change to Daylight Saving Time than during the rest of the year.

They are subject to circadian rhythms The sleep wake cycle. It determines when we feel the call of Morpheus and when the body wants to wake up and get back in action. Body temperature. It varies from about 1 ° C per day. Normally it is at its minimum at about 4 am and reached its peak in the evening. Hormone production. Melatonin (which promotes sleep), for example, is produced from the early evening, while the secretion of cortisol and testosterone (which help to stay alert) is maximum in the morning. The mood. The feeling of well-being is usually lowest early in the morning and it increases gradually during the day. It usually reaches its highest point in the late evening. Tolerance to pain. It is higher in the afternoon. Dental pain, for example, often seem more bearable in the late afternoon. Heart rate, alertness and memory are also subject to circadian rhythms.