Women who worry about cancer — even those who have not been diagnosed with the disease — may literally lose sleep over it, according to a new study.

A study looked at more than 1,000 women from 50 to 70 years old. It found that 65 percent worried about developing breast cancer, and 49 percent said it caused them to have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep.

Twenty-seven percent said that cancer worry affected their mood, while 25 percent indicated that it affected their daily activity.

The odds of reporting sleep complaints for women who worry about cancer were nearly 50 percent greater than odds for women who reported no cancer worry, the researchers said.

“This is a unique and important finding because sleep-related complaints have never been studied in women who worry about cancer, without a diagnosis, and it provides practitioners with knowledge with regards to identifying and targeting women who report sleep-related complaints with cognitive behavioral