NIGHT SHIFTS WORK HAMPERS HEALTH AS CIRCADIAN RYTHM ALTERED-NOBEL MEDICINE LAURETS 2017

Prof Dr,DRAM,HIV /AIDS,HEPATITIS ,SEX DISEASES & WEAKNESS expert,New Delhi,India, +917838059592

 Different professions across the globe require people to work odd, sometimes bizarre shifts.Various studies have shown and we're sure  that these shifts, especially the night shift, often tend to cause an imbalance within your system and lead to health issues.Even though some may feel comfortable with nights shifts, your health is ultimately bearing the brunt of the changes in your body-clock and lifestyle.
 
             Messing with our body’s clock is dangerous business. In fact, it could make us sick or worse. The inner timekeeper, dubbed the “circadian clock”, governs the day-night cycle that guides sleep and eating patterns, hormones and even body temperature. A recent research suggested that our muscles measure the time of day.It is important enough that the Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded on Monday to three US scientists whose work illuminated the fundamentals of how it ticks. The trio identified genes that regulate the clock, and the mechanism by which light can synchronise it.

     Yet, humans have a long history of overriding the circadian-driven need for sleep, Russell Foster, a professor of circadian neuroscience at Oxford University says the most obvious example being night work.uch tinkering with Mother Nature can have serious consequences ranging from impulsive behaviour to life-threatening conditions such as obesity and cancer, the experts say.

J            ust look at the poor health records of shift workers such as nurses or factory labourers. The World Health Organization has already raised the red flag, with a 2007 report noting that “circadian disruption” is “probably carcinogenic” — which means cancer-causing.The trouble is that the human body never really adapts to operating outside the normal cycle of working by day, and sleeping at night. Like everyone else, shift workers’ biological clocks are set by the rising and setting of the Sun — not their work schedule.

          “There is no medicine in the world that allows us to speed up or slow down our body clock,” said Claude Gronfier, a neurobiologist at France’s Inserm research institute.An ‘exciting stage’
When workers force themselves to stay awake, it triggers the release of stress hormones such as cortisol — the same one that rushes into our blood in a life-or-death situation.

The chemicals may keep us on our feet, but they are a bargain with the devil. For example, cortisol works to suppress the immune system and in the long run can make us more susceptible to a range of illnesses, including cancer.Such a lifestyle also opens one up to eating outside of normal times, when the body’s metabolism might be lower and the calories are more likely to be converted into fat instead of being burnt up.“We are raising our heart rate, raising our blood pressure and insulin levels at a time that we would not ordinarily do that,” says Hugh Piggins, a neuroscience professor at the University of Manchester. “we and body is basically not ready for it and we are giving it a bit of an insult.”

Even short-term disruptions of the circadian clock can wreak havoc with our body. Just think jet lag. Flying from Paris to Los Angeles deposits travellers nine hours earlier in time, upending eating and sleeping patterns.The results can be blunted interaction with the world and a lack of empathy, complex thinking, or even clear memories. In such a state, people can do “overly impulsive things — jump the red traffic light and fail to see the consequences of actions,” explained Foster.

Better understanding of the workings of the body clock has opened up a fascinating field of scientific quest. Circadian dysfunction has been linked to depression, bipolar disorder, cognitive function, memory formation and even some neurological diseases.

Over the past two decades, scientists have been studying how the timing of administering a medicine can impact how well it works. Already, they have found that changing the timing can reduce the toxicity of some compounds.

“Now we are moving to the exciting stage where we can start translating some of this knowledge into understanding what happens when these systems go wrong and more importantly to develop new therapeutic interventions,” Foster said