Sleep Disturbances Improve After Retirement
Science Daily, November 1st, 2009
A new study in the journal
Sleep shows that retirement is
followed by a sharp decrease in the prevalence of sleep disturbances.
Findings suggest that this general improvement in sleep is likely to
result from the removal of work-related demands and stress rather than
from actual health benefits of retirement.
Results show that the odds of having disturbed sleep in the seven
years after retirement were 26 percent lower (adjusted odds ratio of
0.74) than in the seven years before retiring. Sleep disturbance
prevalence rates among 14,714 participants fell from 24.2 percent in
the last year before retirement to 17.8 percent in the first year after
retiring. The greatest reduction in sleep disturbances was reported by
participants with depression or mental fatigue prior to retirement. The
postretirement improvement in sleep also was more pronounced in men,
management-level workers, employees who reported high psychological job
demands, and people who occasionally or consistently worked night
shifts.
Lead author Jussi Vahtera, professor in the department of public
health at the University of Turku in Finland, noted that the
participants enjoyed employment benefits rarely seen today, including
guaranteed job stability, a statutory retirement age between 55 and 60
years, and a company-paid pension that was 80 percent of their salary.
"We believe these findings are largely applicable in situations
where financial incentives not to retire are relatively weak," said
Vahtera. "In countries and positions where there is no proper pension
level to guarantee financial security beyond working age, however,
retirement may be followed by severe stress disturbing sleep even more
than before retirement."
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