Approved Research

To explore the prospective correlation between sleep disorders and thyroid function.

Lay summary

More than a third of adults are now experiencing sleep disorders. Sleep disorders can be manifested as insufficient sleep, insomnia, poor sleep quality, circadian rhythm disorder, etc., which will affect people's health, psychology, quality of life, social function and even life safety. Therefore, sleep disorders may also have a significant impact on thyroid function, leading to the mobidity of thyroid dysfunction including hypothyroidism (the thyroid gland produces and releases too little hormone) or hyperthyroidism (the thyroid gland produces and releases too much hormone). Thyroid dysfunction affects almost every organ or system of the whole body, leading to impaired memory, pathesia, mood disorders, subfertility, female infertility, muscle weakness, muscle spasm, arrhythmia, and deterioration of renal function, which increases the risk of cardiovascular disease, hyperlipidemia, and nervous system diseases. It is also associated with increased all-cause mortality and ovarian, breast, and cardiovascular mortality. Therefore, it is important to explore the risk of sleep disorders for thyroid dysfunction. Good sleep is expected to be used as a non-pharmacological intervention to prevent or treat thyroid dysfunction, thereby reducing the occurrence of subsequent adverse events. Based on this, we plan to explore whether sleep disorders lead to thyroid dysfunction in a prospective cohort of UK Biobank within the  project duration of 2 years. Public health impact: this study is based on answering the question: Does poor sleep cause thyroid dysfunction? It will further confirms the damage of poor sleep to human health and calls on the public to maintain a good sleep pattern: sufficient sleep time and healthy sleep rhythm, which may prevent future thyroid dysfunction and reduce medical economic burden.