Written By
Brandon R. Peters, MD
August 20, 2018
Want to improve your mental health? Focus on this.
People make time for their mental health in a variety of ways, from meditation, to therapy, to yoga and exercise. As it turns out, there’s a huge opportunity for boosting mental health that many miss out on: sleep. Conditions like insomnia and other sleep problems are more common in people with depression, anxiety, and other mental health disorders. The overlap can be difficult to tease apart. What comes first? Sleep clinicians have hypothesized about the link between sleep disorders and mental health for decades. Ongoing, chronic sleep problems affect 50 to 80 percent of adults under psychiatric care, compared to just 10 to 18 percent of those in the general U.S. population.
