Sleep Disorders - Assignment Example

? Sleep Disorders Introduction Sleep disorders affect approximately one in seven Americans and this is possibly similar to other western nations. In the case of developing nations, poverty and other harsh conditions have enormous impacts on sleep habits and consequent sleep disorders. For instance, studies indicate that roughly one third of the population in India sleeps where they are standing when it is time to sleep. In Europe, a large segment of elderly people develops sleep disorders including sleep apnoea and insomnia, which are more frequent (Shapiro & Dement, 1993). In Austria, a quarter of the population admits having irregular sleeping patterns. Several studies indicate that industrious countries record prevalence rates of between 20-30%. In Austria, unceasing sleep disorders typify those in the general population. In addition, sleep disturbance is the recurrent problem, but extended sleep latency appears to be the most generally treated one. Furthermore, increasing age affects the occurrence of sleep disorders and use of sleeping drugs (Schmeiser-Rieder et al, 1995). According to a 1998 study, at least 16 000 men experience sleep apnoea syndrome in the Netherlands. In addition, the study estimated the occurrence of clinically major sleep apnoea syndrome to be no less than 0.45% in men aged 35 and above (Neven et al, 1998). Prevalence, causes, and common types of sleep disorders The occurrence of sleep disorders differ with respect to different ages, with most effect occurring to children and teenagers. There are disparities in behavioral, psychosomatic and developmental features of infancy sleep patterns as well as the structure and pathophysiology of sleep in children. These features cause age-related disparities in presentation for sleep disorders. In children, sleep disorders are very ordinary, and primary care providers can manage them at their early stages. However, this is only possible if parents would take a step of presenting their children and reporting sleeping difficulties as early as possible. According to epidemiological studies, there is a strong correlation between sleep disorders and noteworthy behavioral complexities. Moreover, personal observations indicate children with augmented behavioral difficulties as poor sleepers. In addition, most parents indicate increased resistant and hostile behavior, along with nervousness symptoms, in children with sleep disarrays (Heussler, 2005). Children, who are vulnerable to developmental and behavioral difficulties, might undergo double hazard due to sleep problems. These children are particularly susceptible to these problems due to parental substance abuse, mental sickness, aggression in the home and poverty. These children are vulnerable to development sleep disorders and are less likely to receive diagnosis of sleep problems. This is highly because of restricted access to health care services, abandonment, disordered home settings and unceasing medical issues like iron deficiency anemia. Moreover, these children are prone to undergo more serious outcomes from those sleep problems than their less susceptible peers (Owens, 2008). Pediatricians frequently deem conditions such as sleepwalking, talking, and night terrors as normal since they are so regular in children. Rigorous exhaustion or illness might induce these disorders of stimulation. Particularly, nightmares, frequent before the age of 10 years, cause nervousness in school-aged children. Convulsion disorders frequently occur in childhood or teenage years and they have recurrent relationship with epilepsy. Most sleep disorders in adolescents originate from untreated childhood sleep disorders. The most ordinary sleep disorder in teenagers is Insomnia, with occurrence ranging between 2.2 and 17%. This depends on whether the dysfunction is complexity-initiating sleep, bothered sleep affecting daytime functioning, non-recuperative sleep, or sleep disturbance (Halbower & Marcus, 2003). Mahowald & Schenck (2005) present various types of sleep disorders. The most widespread sleep complaint in the public is insomnia. The description of insomnia is the failure to get sleep that is enough to make one feel relaxed or reinstated the next day, but not by total sleep time. Surprising enough, most of the insomnia patients do not have any particular psychological or psychiatric problems. On the other hand, narcolepsy is a rather rare neurological disorder affecting one in every 2,000 people. Among its characteristics are, the trend to fall asleep inaptly during the day, especially during non-stimulating or sedentary activities, in spite of having got enough sleep the previous night. Restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a common cause of severe insomnia. This is a neurological sensory/movement disorder, which affects about 5–15% of the general population. Insomnia mostly occurs in the form of an unclear and difficult-to-describe unpleasant feeling in the legs. This feeling appears mainly during periods of inactivity, mainly during the switch from wake to sleep in the evening. The experiential phenomena or unlikable or undesirable behavioral that happen mainly or exclusively during sleep is known as parasomnias. In addition, parasomnias are the manifestation of a wide range of different conditions but not a unitary phenomenon of which most are diagnosable and treatable. Another disorder is the obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) mainly seen in people who are loud snorers and is denoted by collapse of the upper airway during sleep. The upper airway collapse may be as a result of a decrease in the blood oxygen level resulting to repetitive arousals to reestablish upper airway airflow. Neven et al (1998) adds that the episodes of sleep apnoea syndrome could cause harmful effects of a mental or physical nature. These effects include excessive daytime sleepiness, fatigue, and cardiovascular morbidity. Other types of sleep disorders, which mostly affect children, include Sleepiness and Sleep-onset association disorder. Although sleepiness is a regular reason for presentation in primary care, it can be misinterpreted and under-recognized because of fallacies about differences in chronicity, normal sleep patterns and developmental issues. For instance, excessive sleepiness in a child may appear as normal sleeping for longer time compared to other children of the same age, requiring naps when other children of the same age do not, or altering sleep pattern to sleeping for a longer time. Sleepiness symptoms may result from one of these three reasons: sleep fragmentation; increased need for sleep; and insufficient sleep. On the other hand, Sleep-onset association disorder occurs when a child develops a habit of falling asleep in a specific situation. In addition, if related conditions are absent, the child will have problems getting back to sleep after waking during the night or settling to sleep in the evening. This can also happen when children associate some things with falling sleep, for example those children used to being fed during the night or having a dummy before sleeping. This disorder is widespread in toddlers although it can present at all ages (Heussler, 2005). There are a number of child, parental, and environmental variables, which can affect the type, relative prevalence, chronicity, and severity of sleep problems. It is evident that sleep in particular, can act as a kind of barometer of a child’s physical and mental health. Among the child variables that could affect sleep significantly, include the presence of comorbid developmental, medical, or psychiatric conditions, temperament and behavioral style, individual variations in circadian preference, and cognitive and language abilities. In addition, parental variables include mental health issues, such as maternal depression; parenting and discipline styles; medical issues; family stress; differences between mothers and fathers in regards to perception of their child’s sleep and parents’ education level and knowledge of child development; quality and quantity of parents’ sleep. On the other hand, environmental variables include socioeconomic status; family composition, lifestyle issues and even the physical sleeping environment. In addition, there has been a remarkable link between television viewing habits and sleep problems in children according to studies (Owens, 2008). Impacts of sleep disorders and their management Sleep disturbance in various medical disorders makes managing the disorder more complex. Most of the sleep disorders affect the victims in diverse ways. These include reduction of education performance, decrease in work capability and lack of maximizing on opportunities. Other negative consequences include psychosocial consequences, and a constraint of leisure and enjoyment time (Shapiro & Dement, 1993). Narcolepsy evidently has an unconstructive effect on the quality of life, most overwhelmingly affecting general wellbeing, social function and physical pain (Phillips et al, 2008). Many parents with affected children report that their children demonstrate various negative behaviors. These include grumpiness, augmented subjective daytime drowsiness, behavioral problems and learning difficulties. A study carried out among basic school-aged children, to determine effects of sleep problems, teachers cited behavioral indication of momentous daytime sleepiness in the classroom in 10% of their students. This indication is true since sleep disorders mostly affect schoolchildren (Owens, 2008). In the case of children, behavioral interventions prove to be very effective in managing and treating sleep disorders. This is because most of the consequences of sleep disorders in children are behavioral. In most cases, parents institute these interventions with primary care providing education and support. For instance, “extinction” or “ignoring” approaches can curb night settling or night waking problems caused by sleep-onset association disorder. This entails the parents “leaving the child to cry until he or she falls asleep,” after first making sure that there is no other cause for the anguish (Heussler, 2005). In the case of adults, studies have revealed enhanced sleep with psychological behavioral interventions of insomnia in both women and men. These interventions include motivation control, relaxation methods, sleep hygiene trainings and sleep restraint therapy. These interventions have proved to be very effective in treating sleep disorders over long-standing follow-up. When treating, Narcolepsy, there should be prominence of the significance of sleep hygiene. In addition, there should be consideration of behavioral procedures to improve attentiveness during vital times of the day (Phillips et al, 2008). Schmeiser-Rieder and co-authors (1995) recommend that there is a need for reporting sleep problems at an early stage. This is very vital particularly in small children since the doctors or therapists may help to prevent the problems crossing over to teenage years. This is a significant aspect due to the high occurrence of constant sleep disorders especially in children. A major problem that arises is that many cases of sleep disorders remain undiagnosed and untreated. This is highly because most victims of the disorders and their caregivers deem the disorders as normal occurrences hence do not bother to seek for treatment. Due to the high prevalence of sleep disorders and their negative effects, there is need for development of long-term strategies to address them including awareness creation. Conclusion Sleep disorders are conditions that affect nearly all the age groups but most particularly children who are in school. The knowledge of these disorders clearly demonstrates and explains why some people have different sleep behaviors and sleep patterns. These disorders have profound consequences in both children and adults. In case of schooling children, there is reduced concentration in schoolwork performance and psychological problems. Others include increased sleepiness during the day, anxiety and night walking. Effective management of sleep disorders rests on behavioral interventions rather than pure medication. Behavioral modifying techniques prove to be very effective since most causes and effects of the disorders are psychological. There needs to be long-term planning for diagnosis and treatment of sleep disorders. There should also be significant awareness creation to alert people on the importance of reporting sleep problems to a doctor. By this, many people would change their perspectives concerning sleep disorders by viewing them as chronic conditions rather than mere normal occurrences. References Halbower, A.C. & Marcus, C.L. (2003). Sleep disorders in children. Current Opinion in Pulmonary Medicine, 9, 471-476. Heussler, H.S. (2005). Common causes of sleep disruption and daytime sleepiness: childhood sleep disorders II. MJA, 182, 9, 484–489. Mahowald, M.W. & Schenck, C.H. (2005). Insights from studying human sleep disorders. Nature, 437, 27, 1279-1285. Neven, A.K. et al. (1998). The prevalence of clinically significant sleep apnoea syndrome in the Netherlands. Thorax, 53, 638-642. Owens, J. (2008). Classification and Epidemiology of Childhood Sleep Disorders. Primary Care Clinics in Office Practice, 35, 533-546. Phillips, B.A. et al. (2008). Sleep Disorders and Medical Conditions in Women. Journal of Women’s Health, 17, 7, 1191-1196. Schmeiser-Rieder, A. et al. (1995). Self reported prevalence and treatment of sleep disorders in Austria. Journal of Epidemiology Community Health, 49, 645-646. Shapiro, C.M. & Dement, W.C. (1993). Impact and Epidemiology of Sleep Disorders. BMJ, 306, 1604-1607. Read More