Attention dog owners: For healthy sleep, don’t let Fido share your bed

Scottsdale, AZ – Catching some zzzs with your dog can be beneficial to your health – as long as your dog sleeps on the floor and not in bed with you, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Researchers analyzed the sleep habits of 40 adults and their dogs over a five-month period. For seven nights, participants and their pooches wore activity trackers. For the dog owners, the tracker monitored light and motion to provide data points for time in bed, total sleep time, sleep efficiency and wake time after sleep onset. The dogs wore trackers so the researchers could measure their activity level (rest, active or at play).

The result: Owners maintained good sleep efficiency with their dogs in the bedroom; however, the good efficiency decreased when the dogs were on the bed.

“Most people assume having pets in the bedroom is a disruption,” Dr. Lois Krahn, a sleep medicine specialist at Mayo Clinic’s Center for Sleep Medicine and study co-author, said in a press release. “We found that many people actually find comfort and a sense of security from sleeping with their pets (nearby).”

The study was published in the September issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings.