 |
|
|
Clinical and Historical Predictors of Sleep Disturbances in School-Age Children
Oliviero Bruni, M.D., Elisabetta Verrillo, M.D., Silvia Miano, M.D., and Salvatore Ottaviano, M.D.
Several studies attempted to evaluate the predictive value or the associated risk of several factors only on generic sleep disorders and mainly night-wakings. Aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of biological and historical and clinical factors on the different aspect of sleep behavior and disturbances evaluated by the Sleep Disturbance Scale for Children. Mothers of 1157 children (583 M, 574 F) aged 6.5 to 15.3 years (mean 9.8) completed the SDSC together with a questionnaire on demographic data about family composition, parentÕs education and professional activities, as well as clinical data about pregnancy, delivery and medical history of the child with specific questions regarding pathologies that could affect sleep; sleep habits of parents and children were also investigated. Global sleep disturbances measured as SDSC total score were affected by co sleeping, early sleep disorders, adenotonsillitis, asthma and parentsÕ sleep disorders. Early sleep disorders, asthma and parentsÕ sleep disorders had a significant main effect on disorders of initiating and maintaining sleep. Sleep breathing disorders score was associated with the presence of cosleeping, adenotonsillitis, asthma, food allergy. Disorders of Arousal score was affected by early sleep disorders and parentsÕ sleep disorders. There was a significant main effect of co-sleeping, early sleep disorder, adenotonsillitis, parentsÕ sleep disorder on sleep-wake transition disorders score; of gender, parentsÕ sleep disorder on Disorders of excessive somnolence score and of gender, early sleep disorder and parentsÕ sleep disorder on Sleep hyperhydrosis score. Post-hoc comparisons showed that females vs. males have higher scores in Disorders of excessive somnolence score while males scored higher in Sleep hyperhydrosis score. A visual generalized model revealed that predictors for Total SDSC score are early sleep disorders, parentsÕ sleep disorders, adenotonsillitis and asthma. Our results underline the role of genetic and neurobiological substrate on the development of children sleep, delineating the areas of the sleep that are involved and rising some suggestions on which factors could lead to different later sleep disturbances. (Sleep and Hypnosis 2000;4:147-151)
| Keywords: sleep disorders, predictors, children |
|
|
| To download full text of articles please |
|
|
|
|
