Surprising ways the clocks changing can affect your health

It helps to form new pathways in the brain so we can retain more information, it’s essential for physical repair and healing, and it makes us feel more productive. There is no greater feeling than waking up refreshed, arms stretched, in silk pyjamas, like a perfectly poised coffee advert. Prepare yourselves, because from this moment until Saturday evening you will likely have to navigate the tango that is ‘don’t forget to turn the clocks forward’, ‘I thought they go back’, ‘it’s definitely forward, by an hour.’ For the record, this Sunday (October 27, 2019) at 1am they go back an hour. For example, if you think back to when we were cavemen and women, in the morning the light would enter our eyes, which would reduce the amount of the hormone melatonin being produced. From car accidents to strokes, a mere hour jump in your body clocks can affect our health and wellbeing.   The University of Colorado at Boulder conducted research into a correlation between Daylight Saving Time and traffic incident-related deaths and discovered that there was a 17 percent increase on the Monday after the Spring change. Similarly, in 1999, researchers at Johns Hopkins University and Stanford analysed 21 years of fatal car crash data from the US National Highway Transportation Safety Administration and discovered a slight increase of road deaths. Daily saving really does add an acute abruptness.’   He goes on to explain that an increase in road accidents may be caused by our melatonin levels being ‘completely out of whack’. ‘Daylight Saving Time is going to have an impact on the body because it’s a sudden change’ says Gannon, although he adds that there's probably no major cause for concern unless you have an underlying health condition. ‘What we tend to find is those people that do have a good sleep have a much better level of cortisol, which is a stress hormone within in the body,’ explains Gannon. Typically, they tend to be office bound, as opposed to outdoor workers.’ He goes on to add that there’s research pointing to SAD being trigger by a cumulation of factors, that reach their height at this time of year. ‘The weather is harsher, rainy, a bit more grey, there are colder temperatures and reduced sunlight and it can impact on SAD.’ ‘Those that generally get a good night sleep are in a much better mood,’ smiles Gannon.