If you need an excuse to sleep in this weekend, look no further: A study presented at a recent meeting of the European Society of Cardiology showed that catching up with sleep over the weekend is good for your heart.
The new findings happily contrast with the older prevailing thought, that you can’t “make up” for sleep you’ve lost during the week.
The study out of China’s National Center for Cardiovascular Disease noted that those who’ve slept poorly Monday through Friday, but got some solid sack time on the weekends, saw a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease compared to those who chose not to.
The study watched more than 90,000 participants over 14 years, and the researchers discovered that the group that slept the most on weekends was 19% less likely to develop heart disease than their early-to-rise counterparts.
For those who reported being “sleep deprived” during the week, that reduction moved up to 20%.
For the record, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine still recommends you get a minimum of seven hours of sleep every day — but if anyone’s wondering why you’re not hitting the ground running on Saturday, you can always point them to the new study.