People who suffer from insomnia face a 26 per cent higher risk of stroke than those who sleep well, according to a major new umbrella review of sleep research.

The analysis, published in Sleep Medicine Reviews, pooled data from more than 1.3 million participants across multiple systematic reviews, News-Medical reported.

Researchers found that people with insomnia had a hazard ratio of 1.26 for stroke, with a confidence interval of 1.05 to 1.53. They also had 28 per cent higher odds of being admitted to hospital, according to the study reported by Medical Xpress.

The review also linked poor sleep to higher rates of dementia, depression and suicidal behaviour, though the authors stressed that these are associations rather than proven causes.

Stefan Seidel, a sleep medicine expert at MedUni Vienna, said sleep should be part of the conversation about brain health at every age. He called for sleep to be treated with the same seriousness as blood pressure and cholesterol in preventive care.