Esteban Ortiz Prado

According to the findings of two clinical trials published in Annals of Internal Medicine, adults at high cardiometabolic risk who slept almost 80 minutes less per night for six weeks gained nearly half a kilogram on average and experienced an increase in waist circumference. The studies included a total of 95 participants, all of whom had a habitual sleep duration of at least seven hours per night. Sleep restriction was also associated with increased leptin levels, a hormone involved in regulating energy balance, and with greater sedentary time.

An experimental drug called mavoglurant can reduce the consumption of both cocaine and alcohol in people with cocaine use disorder, according to the results of a phase 2 clinical trial with 68 participants. Although trials with more participants are needed, the results suggest that this drug should be studied further. The findings, in which Spanish teams have participated, are published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

Drinking alcohol and sleeping in hypobaric conditions - such as those of an aircraft cabin - could be a risk to cardiovascular health, a study warns. Researchers compared a group of 23 people sleeping in a laboratory with another group of 17 people sleeping in a high-altitude chamber, replicating conditions at about 2,400 metres above sea level. The combination of alcohol consumption and hypobaric hypoxia during the simulation "reduced sleep quality, challenged the cardiovascular system and led to extended duration of hypoxaemia," the authors state in the journal Thorax.