Men who go to bed before 10:30 p.m. are 4 times more likely to have good quality sperm compared to those who go to bed after 11:30 p.m.
Sleeping is good for health, but also for fertility! Researchers from Aarhus University in Denmark show that sleeping early and long leads to better quality sperm. Their results were presented at the Congress of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) and reported by the British media The Independent.
Go to bed before 10:30 p.m.
A hundred men volunteered for the study: the majority of them had low quality sperm, the others had good quality sperm. The researchers looked at their sleeping habits. Men who go to bed early, before 10:30 p.m., are 4 times more likely to have good quality sperm compared to those who go to bed after 11:30 p.m. Compared to those who go to sleep between 10:30 p.m. and 11:30 p.m., those who go to bed early are 2.75 times more likely to have better quality sperm.
Eight hours a night, an ideal amount of sleep
Sleep duration also matters for fertility: those who sleep less than seven hours a night are six times more likely to have poor sperm quality compared to those who don’t. Conversely, sleeping eight hours a night would be ideal for improving the quality of seminal fluid. The link between sleep and fertility has yet to be studied, but researchers already have some hypotheses.
“The reasons could be psychological, underlines Jakob Ingerslev, author of this study. Men who do not sleep enough suffer more from stress and this can have an impact on fertility”. Lack of sleep is not inevitable. Some habits can be changed to make for better nights. The researchers recommend thinking about the causes of late sleep: smartphone use, watching series online, television in the bedroom, etc.
