Many teens have a sleep deficit

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Dec. 4 (UPI) -- Teens have a strikingly high risk for chronic sleep debt: 83 percent of teens slept less than eight hours per night on weekends, Argentine researchers say.

The study, published in the journal Sleep, found 49 percent of 2,884 teens slept less than eight hours per night on weekdays as reported by their parents.

"While students in other populations attempt to catch up on sleep debt during weekends, youngsters in our sample seemed to aggravate their sleep debt by further reducing sleep time on weekends," study author Dr. Daniel Perez-Chada, of Hospital Universitario Austral in Buenos Aires, says in a statement. "Thus, this population appears to be at a strikingly high risk for chronic sleep debt. This and other sleep problems need to be confronted through education and enhanced diagnosis of a sleep related breathing disorder as well as changing poor sleep habits among adolescents."

Researchers recommend teens get about nine hours of sleep each night.