If you live in a house that lacks good air quality, you won’t get the full benefits of sleep. As we all know, sleep is essential for your health. So, anything that affects your quality of sleep affects your overall health. There are particular ways through which air quality impacts your sleep. This article focuses on 3 ways air quality affects your sleep and how you can improve it.
How Does Air Quality Affect Your Sleep?
Presence of Air Pollutants
Pollutants are one of the ways through which air quality is affected. If you sleep in a poorly ventilated room, you may find it difficult to sleep well because of the accumulation of pollutants. Carbon dioxide is one of the pollutants that affect air quality. Excessive exposure to carbon dioxide leads to low levels of sleep efficiency.
The quality of air around your room determines whether you sleep well or not. If there are high levels of pollutants inside a room, the persons who occupy the room cannot enjoy quality sleep. Unless you take measures like adequate ventilation, you’ll be depriving your body of efficient sleep.
Presence of Allergens
Allergens are also known to affect air quality and, in the process, affect a person’s quality of sleep. Allergens cause allergy symptoms that make it difficult for one to have a good sleep. A good example of the allergy symptoms you’re likely to show once exposed to allergens is nasal congestion. If you develop nasal congestion while you’re asleep, you’ll definitely not be able to sleep comfortably.
You’ll find most allergy triggers in the bedroom. Examples of allergy triggers include dust mites, mold, and pet dander. If you don’t make a point of getting rid of allergens, they accumulate in bedding and can be problematic for people vulnerable to allergies. If you happen to have extended periods of exposure to allergens at night, you’re likely to develop nasal congestion. If this happens, you’ll find yourself struggling with insomnia, daytime sleepiness, and poor quality sleep.
For one to have good quality sleep, resting should be uninterrupted. Unfortunately, allergens interrupt the patterns that count for quality sleep. They disrupt the deep and regular breathing patterns required for quality sleep. Additionally, they are likely to worsen allergy symptoms, thus making it difficult to sleep well.
Excessive Humidity Levels
Excessive humidity levels also affect air quality. Excessively high and low humidity levels are not ideal for quality sleep. High levels of humidity affect one’s sleeping cycles. High humidity keeps you awake for long and, of course, affects your quality of sleep. Humidity results in dampness, which increases the risk of respiratory infections and breathing problems. Air quality in excessively humid environments is not ideal for quality sleep. Therefore, you’ll keep having disrupted sleep if you stay in a moist room.
Allergens are also a concern if your room is humid. The reactions triggered by allergens make it difficult for one to sleep well. The bottom line is that both high and low humidity levels affect air quality in a room and, as a result, limit the ability to have quality sleep.
How to Improve Air Quality
There are proven ways of improving air quality for good sleep. The following are the steps you should take to ensure you have the required air quality for your family’s sleep quality.
Ventilation
Ventilation is one of the most significant considerations for improving sleep quality. The indoor air in your room plays a major role in determining whether you experience good and healthy sleep or not. It’s important to take note that ventilation is helpful if the source of air is clean. There are instances whereby the air outside your home is not clean to bring the freshness inside your house.
For this reason, always make sure that when you open your windows and doors the air coming in is cleaner than the one inside your house. This will make the ventilation process fruitful. Opening a door or window helps let out polluted air inside the house and lets in quality air. This is what you need to prevent the levels of carbon dioxide from reaching toxic levels.
A valuable tip here is to be careful with the air you allow inside your room. If the air outside isn’t cleaner than the one indoors, you would rather open an interior door. This will help prevent more pollution inside your room. Ventilation will help you improve air quality while you are asleep.
Using an Air Purifier
Another way of improving air quality for your good night’s sleep is using an air purifier. When you’re asleep you may not notice that there’s air pollution in your room. This leads to disrupted sleep because of the strain your body is going through. Thankfully, you can use an air purifier to purify the polluted air in your room. This product comes in handy to ensure that there is a flow of fresh and quality air in your bedroom. It helps to substitute polluted air with fresh air, allowing you to sleep well.
To get the maximum benefit from your air purifier, you should put it close to your bed. It will work well if you place it at the level of your head. Make sure that there is nothing that blocks the flow of air from the purifier. Any obstruction like a wall will limit its capacity to provide you will quality air for quality sleep.
Though it’s not enough to completely get rid of carbon dioxide build-up like ventilation does, an air purifier is a viable option to help you have quality sleep. The good thing is that it is a portable device that allows you to carry it with ease.
Related: Humidifier vs Air Purifier, what’s the difference?
Using a Humidistat
A humidistat is an important device for controlling the quality of air in your room. For anyone having a problem controlling humidity levels in their homes, a humidistat comes in handy to restore the required level of humidity.
All you need is to mount the device on your wall and connect it to your home’s HVAC system. Once you set your humidistat to the appropriate humidity levels, your room will maintain the required air quality. This is what you need to have a good night’s rest without disruptions.
Eradicating Mold and other Sources of Allergens
Ventilation and air purification help to control the pollutants already in the air. Though they do a great deal of control to maintain a high level of air quality, they don’t destroy the source of allergens that affect air quality. That’s why eradicating mold and other sources of allergens goes a long way to deal with the problem. This is the strategy that makes the biggest impact in preventing air pollution.
For mold eradication, it is imperative to deal with standing water. You should eliminate anything that leads to water stagnation in your home. A good example is leaky pipes. Ensure that you repair leaky pipes to avoid the accumulation of mold around your house.
If you notice mold growing in your home, you should eliminate it immediately. Diluted bleach is one of the substances you can use to destroy the mold and prevent its growth. If the mold doesn’t cover a large area and it doesn’t recur, you can remove it on your own without the need for a specialist.
For other sources of allergens, cleaning your bedding regularly in warm water will help improve air quality. Weekly washing is a great practice to help you have quality sleep. Another way of keeping allergens at bay is keeping pets away from your bedroom. This goes a long way to ensure that the air quality in your bedroom is at its optimum best. Moreover, it’s advisable to shower before going to your bedroom. This helps to get rid of pollen and other allergens that may be on your body.
Wrap Up
Certainly, sleep is crucial for your overall health. It is something you need constantly to maintain the optimum functioning of your body. While other factors affect sleep quality, air quality in your bedroom is one you cannot underestimate. You should make it a priority to create an environment that allows you to enjoy good air quality.
There are things you can do to ensure that your room maintains the right levels of air quality. Essentially, you should ensure that you put air pollutants at bay. This will make the air in your room clean. Indeed, it is possible to always enjoy good sleep. However, you have to put in efforts to maintain the right air quality in your room.
Keep the Air in Your Home Clean and Fresh
Choosing environmentally friendly cleaning products and filling your home with greenery will improve its air quality. The aroma of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies couldn’t hurt, either.
Thanks to our tips, you can create ideal conditions in the bedroom for a comfortable pastime and a pleasant sleep. A night of healthy sleep will help improve immunity, get a supply of energy, and a good mood for the whole day.
There are many reasons why people don’t get the quantity or the quality sleep that they need. If your sleep problems are a consistent issue, call Alaska Sleep Clinic today @ 907-770-9104 and speak with one of our board-certified sleep specialists. Our free consultation will get you on the right track to improving your sleep and your life.
