Stolen hour: More heart attacks after changing the time
All content is checked by medical journalists.MunichThe changeover to summer time is a problem for many. A long-term analysis by DAK-Gesundheit shows that the time change actually has a negative impact on health: In the days after the change, 25 percent more insured persons with heart problems are admitted to hospital than the annual average.
Time change with consequences
An average of 30 patients insured with her would be admitted to German clinics every day because of a heart attack, according to a press release from DAK-Gesundheit. With 6.4 million insured persons, the DAK is one of the largest German health insurance companies. Now she wanted to know whether the changeover to summer time has an impact on the risk of heart attacks. To do this, the experts compared the data transmitted annually by the hospitals since 2006.
Lack of sleep, disruption of the biorhythm and stress
The result was surprising, at least in its clarity: On the three days after the time change, an average of 40 hospital admissions with a diagnosis of myocardial infarction were reported - a third more than the annual mean. “We have been observing this development for a number of years,” explains DAK hospital expert Peter Rohwolt. Reasons for the higher risk of heart attack are probably a lack of sleep and the sudden change in biorhythm. When switching to summer time on the last weekend in March, the clock is put forward by one hour, which means that the night on Sunday is one hour shorter.
The biorhythm is controlled, among other things, by the eye, whose brightness information is processed by a special region in the brain stem. This in turn serves as a central clock that apparently supplies every single cell in the body with information about the time of year and day, researchers suspect.
"Set back three weeks"
"Strictly speaking, the changeover to summer time will not move us an hour forward, but rather three weeks," explains Prof. Till Roenneberg from the Center for Chronobiology in Munich. That is exactly the time that the sun needs to work up to the current status. The missing hour therefore messes up the entire biorhythm. The result: general exhaustion and exhaustion. The switch to summer time causes both psychological and physical stress. "And that increases the heart attack rate for weeks after the change from winter to summer time," continues Roenneberg.
According to the DAK, every fourth German citizen has to struggle with the time change in spring. 70 percent are even in favor of the abolition of summer time. This year the changeover will take place on the night of March 29th to March 30th. At two o'clock the clocks are put forward by one hour.
Source: DAK analysis: more heart attacks due to time change. Press release DAK-Gesundheit. March 24, 2014
Tags: laboratory values first aid Diseases
