Scientists have proven that taking a bath 90 minutes before going to bed can help you get a better nights sleep.
Scientists/researchers at the University of Texas in Austin have been analysing thousands of studies on “water-based passive body heating” or bathing and showering with hot water. They found that bathing between one and two hours before bed in hot/warm water (between 40C and 42C ) can improve how you sleep.
Shahab Haghayegh, a PhD candidate and lead author on the paper, said: “When we looked through all known studies, we noticed significant disparities in terms of the approaches and findings,”
He added: “The only way to make an accurate determination of whether sleep can in fact be improved was to combine all the past data and look at it through a new lens.”
The researchers studied 5,322 studies before publishing the paper. They targeted four areas of sleep in their research. These were: total sleep time, sleep quality, sleep efficiency and how long it takes from being awake to being fast asleep.
Body temperature is closely involved in sleeping patterns. As our body temperature rises during the night it works like a alarm clock and disrupts sleeping.
According to the researchers: “The temperature cycle leads the sleep cycle and is an essential factor in achieving rapid sleep onset and high efficiency sleep.”
Researchers have found the perfect time to have a bath before bed is 90 minutes before. As our core has time to cool down.
According to the researchers: “Warm baths and showers stimulate the body’s thermoregulatory system, causing a marked increase in the circulation of blood from the internal core of the body to the peripheral sites of the hands and feet, resulting in efficient removal of body heat and decline in body temperature,”
They added: “Therefore, if baths are taken at the right biological time, 1-2 hours before bedtime, they will aid the natural circadian process and increase one’s chances of not only falling asleep quickly but also of experiencing better quality sleep.”
By having a bath 90 minutes before researchers found that it decreased the time falling to sleep by 10 minutes on average.
