Journal of Sleep Sciences
Volume:7 Issue: 1, Winter-Spring 2022

A gap exists in evidence of the association between sleep quality and the academic performance of university students in sub-Saharan Africa. A limited number of studies have been conducted in this regard, which have mainly focused on medical students, thus neglecting the larger population of undergraduate non-medical students.

This pilot study evaluated the correlates of sleep quality and the academic performance of 500 randomly sampled undergraduate non-medical students at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. Data was collected using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and a demographic questionnaire. The par-ticipants' demographic characteristics, academic performance, and sleep quality were first analyzed, descriptively, using SPSS software. Relationships between participants’ sleep quality and demographic factors, and sleep quality and aca-demic performance were determined using Spearman’s rank correlation. The causation between these variables was then determined using simple linear regression.

Poor quality of sleep was prevalent among undergraduate students with a mean (SD) PSQI score of 6.43 (2.78). The respondent’s sleep quality had a weak correlation with their academic performance (rs = -0.146; P = 0.001), although poor quality of sleep was a predictor of academic performance [R2 = 0.022; 95% CI (-0.640, -0.168)].

Health education and sleep promotion interventions should be used to encourage good sleep quality and practices among students. Furthermore, the findings point to the need for further studies using a larger population.

Determining sleep quality in hemodialysis patients and kidney transplant recipients can provide valuable clinical information for planning treatment and care in this group of patients. Thus, we compared sleep quality between hemodialysis patients and kidney transplant recipients.

In this cross-sectional study, 60 transplant patients and 60 hemodialysis patients were select-ed using convenience sampling method. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) with 89% validity and 86% reliabil-ity was used to assess patients' sleep quality.

The mean PSQI score was higher in the hemodialysis group (7.78) than the kidney transplantation group (6.15). This indicates that the sleep quality in hemodialysis patients is worse than in patients after kidney transplantation (P = 0.028). The frequency of poor sleep quality in hemodialysis patients was higher than in kidney transplant patients [50(83.3%) vs. 37(61.7%)].

The results of this study indicate that kidney transplant recipients have better sleep quality than hemodial-ysis patients.

Periodic limb movements of sleep (PLMS) and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) are two common sleep disorders that frequently co-occur in one subject. In this study, we evaluated the polysomnographic (PSG) features of patients with OSA with and without PLMS.

Patients with OSA diagnosed by PSG who referred to our sleep clinic over 2 years were
studied for PLMS during a standard diagnostic sleep study. PSG features including apnea-hypopnea index (AHI), oxygen desaturation index (ODI), and sleep quality were evaluated and compared between patients with OSA with and without PLMS.

We evaluated 122 patients with OSA, of whom 17 had comorbid PLMS. Mean sleep quality was significantly lower in patients with PLMS compared to those without PLMS (P < 0.05). There was no significant difference in terms of mean age, gender, arousal index (AI), ODI, and apnea/hypopnea between the two groups.

Patients with OSA with PLMS comorbidity have remarkably lower sleep quality and this finding is independent of the severity of arousals or respiratory events. Proper evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of PLMS comorbidity in patients with OSA might improve treatment response.

After the outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in Iran, to pre-vent the spread of coronavirus, it was decided for classes to be held virtually. Even though this decision reduced the spread of the virus, the students were exposed to smartphone addiction, which is believed to have high comorbidity with psychological problems. The current study aims to examine the relationship between sleep quality and academic per-formance with the degree of dependence on smartphone during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The current research was a cross-sectional study with 254 adolescent students participating in virtual classes. This study was conducted in 2020-2021. The participants filled out the following questionnaires online: Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), smartphone addiction scale (SAS), and Educational Performance Test (EPT). The data were analyzed using SPSS software, descriptive statistics [frequency, pearson correlation, mean, standard deviation (SD)], and inferential statistics (simultaneous regression) (P < 0.05).

There was a significant correlation between components of addiction to the Internet and the study’s variables. The results of correlation analysis showed that there was a significant correlation between Internet addiction and academic performance (Pearson correlation = -0.57, P = 0.01) and between Internet addiction and sleep quality (Pearson correlation = 0.47, P = 0.01).

According to the results, it can be concluded that after the COVID-19 pandemic and virtual education, Internet addiction could be a risk factor for decreasing sleep quality and academic performance in students.

In previous studies, multiple interventions to improve sleep quality were suggested in students with insomnia based on different results. The present study aimed to investigate the effects of combined binau-ral beat treatment on improving sleep quality in students with insomnia.

This was a randomized clinical trial, which included all students living in Neyshabur, Khora-san Razavi Province, Iran, in 2020. In terms of inclusion criteria, 34 students (12 women) were assigned randomly into two control (n = 17) and experimental groups (n = 17). A combined binaural beat treatment (α, θ, and δ) and sleep hy-giene guidelines were given to the experimental group, but the control group only received the same sleep hygiene guidelines. Insomnia Severity Index, Sleep Hygiene Index, and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index were research instru-ments for this purpose. The results were analyzed with SPSS software.

The effect of the combined binaural beats on ISI (F = 31.16, P < 0.001), sleep hygiene (F = 39.15, P < 0.001), and sleep quality (F = 14.15, P < 0.001) of students with insomnia was apparent during multivariate analysis of covari-ance (MANCOVA). The highest and lowest effects on the total value of sleep (effect size = 0.58) and the SHI (effect size = 0.35) were achieved by combined binaural beat treatment.

The combined binaural beats (α, θ, and δ) improve total sleep quality, sleep hygiene, and ISI of students with insomnia. Besides, such a treatment can be utilized as a modern non-invasive intervention.

Beta-thalassemia major is an important health problem in Iran. A high rate of psychiatric disorders has been reported in patients with thalassemia in different surveys and may be one of the reasons that cause problems in the quality of their sleep. Although sleep quality is important for the health and quality of life (QOL) of these patients, a limited study in Iran on sleep quality and its relation to the mental health status of these patients has been conducted so far.

A total of 101 patients with thalassemia were assessed. Data were collected via a demograph-ic information checklist, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), and the 28-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28).

Participants in this study had an average age of 25.90 ± 5.63 years and 71 (70.30%) of them were women. Seventy-seven patients (76.2%) suffered from poor sleep quality while the mean and standard deviation (SD) of the patients' total general health score (31.66 ± 11.35) was good at the general health level. Among the demographic fac-tors, there was a significant relationship between job and sleep quality. Sleep quality, subjective sleep quality, sleep delay, sleep duration, sleep disorders, use of sleeping pills, and daily functional disorders had a positive and significant relationship with general health.

Thalassemia reduces the quality of sleep. There is a positive and significant association between sleep quality and general health, meaning that by improving sleep quality, patients have a greater chance of improving their general health.

The purpose of the current study was to predict the sleep health of dual-career couples based on mindfulness and work-family conflict.

The research method in this study was descriptive and correlational. To achieve the objec-tives, 280 subjects were selected from the statistical population based on the available and simple random sampling method and the population included all dual-career couples of Tehran, Iran, who were living and working in this city in 2020-2021. Data collection was carried out by Sleep Health Scale (SHS) by Becker et al., Work-Family Conflict Scale (WFCS) by Carlson et al., and the Freiburg Mindfulness Inventory (FMI). Data were analyzed by Pearson statistical method to examine the correlation between the dependent variable and independent variables as well as the regression coefficient to predict the sleep health variable by mindfulness and work-family conflict.

A significant negative relationship was found between the sleep health of dual-career couples and work-family conflict. Moreover, a significant positive relationship existed between the sleep health of dual-career couples and mind-fulness. Furthermore, work-family conflict and mindfulness could predict the sleep health of couples. This means that decreased work-family conflict and increased mindfulness lead to better sleep health in dual-career couples.

According to the findings of this study, work-family conflict and mindfulness can predict the sleep health of dual-career couples.

There are several lines of evidence that human dreams depend on the brain's properties in terms of dream structure and its meaning alike (1). The human brain has specific features such as self-organization, memory, self-adaptation, feedback, disorder and diversity, non-equilibrium, etc., which enable the brain to create complex cogni-tive and behavioral functions the most interesting of which must be “dreaming” (2, 3).