Is your daily nap a sign of something more dire?

A nap can be a good way to boost energy throughout the day — but experts say napping too much may also be a sign of a problem with your brain health.

Older Americans who napped every day or most days had a 48 percent higher risk of developing dementia, according to a new 10-year study of nearly 1,000 people on Medicare aged 65 and up.

And unintentional naps or naps for 30 minutes or less were also linked to around a 40 percent higher risk of dementia, the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health said in a release last week.

The researchers believe there’s a two-way relationship between napping and dementia risk.

That means napping is a risk factor for dementia, and degenerating brain regions that regulate wakefulness may lead to more napping. That’s been shown to happen in Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia.

“More frequent napping could be a marker of changes in the brain, rather than a cause of brain changes that lead to dementia,” senior author Adam Spira, a professor in the Bloomberg School’s Department of Mental Health, explained.

That means monitoring napping could help identify older adults at a higher risk for dementia in the future, the researchers said.

However, these findings are only observational and can’t yet conclude that napping causes dementia.

That’s why they’re hoping longer future studies can help look into a person’s overall sleep health, clarifying this relationship and whether changing napping habits could make a positive impact.

The researchers used data from the National Health and Aging Trends Study, a nationally representative survey of around 9,000 older adults.

The findings build on similar research at Harvard and Rush Universities. An April study showed longer and more frequent naps are tied to a higher risk of death and underlying illness in older adults.

Past research into napping and dementia risk has yielded mixed results, the researchers note.

However, there are differences in study design and cultural attitudes toward napping that could shed some light on the inconsistency, they said.

About a third of Americans get a daily nap in, according to the National Sleep Foundation, including more men than women.

Of course, there are also proven benefits to napping.

Naps have been shown to combat fatigue throughout the day and boost employee performance.

Taking a nap can improve memory and enhance mood, research shows.