Too Stressed to Sleep

While reading all of these posts about stress and it's negative impacts on our health, I started thinking about another growing issue in our lives, namely sleep, or the lack thereof. When I'm stressed out, I usually have trouble sleeping. I've heard countless times how horrible sleep deprivation can be for your health, and while I usually respond with jokes along the lines of 'I'll sleep when I'm dead' or 'sleep is for the tired!', these studies about stress are making me reconsider.

I decided to do a bit of research on my own to with regards to the health effects of sleep deprivation, and I have to say I'm rather shocked by some of the articles I found. According to one source, the effects of sleep deprivation on the immune system are very similar to physical stress, making people more vulnerable to infection.

Being a college student, more often than not I don't get more than five or six hours of sleep a night. Combining the detrimental effects from lack of sleep with increased stress do to college courses, I am curious how much of an impact college life has on the health of a student. While it might be an overstatement,  might one say that, as far as health choices go, going to college isn't the best decision? Let me know what you think!