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Textbook of Aging Skin pp 1–13Cite as

Sleep and Aging Skin

Abstract

Aging is a process that is universal and commonly outwardly manifested on the skin and often most significantly noticed on the skin. The prevention of skin aging is currently a multibillion dollar industry with progressive rapid expansion and continues to expand. Intact sleep and circadian rhythm regulation is known to have protective effects against systemic inflammation, oxidative stress, hormone dysregulation, DNA damage, and other variables that contribute to aging. This chapter is focused upon the examination of factors that relate sleep to skin aging. To dissect this relationship, it is necessary to recognize the definitions of adequate sleep quality and how it is assessed. Sleep occurs in alternating cycles of NREM sleep and REM sleep and disruption can decrease sleep quality. In fact, here are over 90 sleep disorders characterized by the International Classification of Sleep Disorders. Various tools in our armamentarium can assess sleep quality and identify sleep disorders including subjective measures collected from questionnaires and objective sleep measures gleaned from polysomnography. Sleep helps regulate physiological hormone levels and metabolism. When quality sleep is disrupted, these hormone levels become abnormal and cause aberrant metabolism and increased stress on the body. Some of the major hormones regulated by sleep are cortisol, glucose, and melatonin. Furthermore, sleep deprivation enhances inflammation, increased DNA damage, and decreased DNA repair; oxidative stress and emerging data implicate sleep disruption in carcinogenic risk. These adverse pathophysiologic consequences may contribute to signs of aging such as wrinkling and alterations in pigmentation. Biologic plausibility of these underlying mechanisms and available data identifying sleep disruption as a factor compromising skin health suggest that it is important to consider methods of improving sleep quality as part of maintaining a healthy skin, in order to minimize or delay such effects.

Keywords

  • Sleep
  • Skin
  • Aging
  • Metabolism
  • Repair
  • Oxidative stress
  • Sleep quality

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Dermatology, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA

    Linna Guan & Elma Baron

  2. Sleep Medicine Center, The Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH, USA

    Reena Mehra

Authors
  1. Linna Guan
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  2. Reena Mehra
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  3. Elma Baron
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Linna Guan .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Procter & Gamble Co., Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

    Miranda A. Farage

  2. Procter & Gamble Co., Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

    Kenneth W. Miller

  3. Department Dermatology, University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine, San Francisco, California, USA

    Howard I. Maibach

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Guan, L., Mehra, R., Baron, E. (2015). Sleep and Aging Skin. In: Farage, M., Miller, K., Maibach, H. (eds) Textbook of Aging Skin. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27814-3_155-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27814-3_155-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-27814-3

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