Millions of Americans use marijuana to sleep, but new study raises troubling questions

Marijuana may be making sleep quality worse, despite its widespread use as a sleep aid, a recent Northwestern Medicine study found.The findings of the study, which included 1,266 participants, showed that both lifetime and recent cannabis users objectively had worse sleep quality, although they did not report their sleep to be worse.Participants were monitored for almost 35 years, from young adulthood into middle age, with scientists tracking their use of cannabis over time.AMERICA HITS MAJOR MARIJUANA MILESTONE AS DAILY WEED USE SURPASSES DAILY DRINKINGIn middle age, participants wore a sleep monitor on their wrist for a week and filled out surveys about their sleep quality.This allowed researchers to compare objective and subjective reports of participants’ sleep.A recent Northwestern Medicine study found that cannabis use does not improve sleep.Instead, it actually worsens people's quality of sleep.

(iStock)"Our data do not support the belief that cannabis is helpful as a sleep aid," said senior study author Mercedes R.Carnethon, Ph.D., as Northwestern Now reported."As cannabis becomes increasingly available and accepted, it's important to better understand its long-term associations with health behaviors such as sleep," Carnethon added.CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR OUR LIFESTYLE NEWSLETTERAmong all participants, a greater lifetime exposure to marijuana was linked to worse objective sleep quality.Those who had a higher cannabis usage over time were generally asleep for a lower percentage of the night and experienced more sleep disruption.The study found that recent cannabis users had more sleep disruption.

(iStock)Similarly, recent cannabis users were more likely to have more sleep fragmentation and lower sleep efficiency, compared to people who never used the substance.The study also found there was a much higher chance that recent cannabis users would sleep longer than eight hours per night. The study discusses the differences between objective and subjective ...