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Quitting tobacco helps improve sleep, a new study suggests.

While many health problems have been directly linked to smoking, researchers said the effects of smoking on sleep are less well known.

Researchers at the University of Florida and Research Triangle Park looked at sleep difficulty by smoking status in a large population-based, nationally representative sample.

Investigators found that 11.9 percent of current smokers have trouble falling asleep, 10. 6 percent wake in the night and 9.5 percent wake too early in the morning. In contrast, rates of sleep difficulty were significantly lower in non-smokers, and those who had given up smoking experienced improvements in their sleep.

The findings also revealed that total sleep time decreased by 1.2 minutes for each cigarette smoked.

Researchers said the latest findings are important because bad sleep has been linked to numerous physical and mental health problems like depression, diabetes and high blood sugar.

The latest findings suggest that smokers may be more prone to illnesses associated with poor sleep along with the more commonly recognized health problems associated with smoking like cancer and cardiovascular disease.

The findings are published in the journal Psychology, Health & Medicine.