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. 2018 Nov;57(13):1515-1522.
doi: 10.1177/0009922818787858. Epub 2018 Jul 17.

Sleep and Gastrointestinal Symptoms in a Community-Based Survey of Children

Erica C Jansen  1 , Galit Levi Dunietz  1 , Barbara T Felt  1 , Louise M O'Brien  1
Affiliations

Sleep and Gastrointestinal Symptoms in a Community-Based Survey of Children

Erica C Jansen et al. Clin Pediatr (Phila). 2018 Nov.

Abstract

We examined whether gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms were associated with sleep disturbances in a community-based sample of 337 school-aged children from Ypsilanti, Michigan. Parents completed the sleep-related breathing disorder scale of the Pediatric Sleep Questionnaire and the Conners' parents rating scale, which included questions concerning GI symptoms. One fifth of the children screened positive for sleep-disordered breathing; the same fraction had sleepiness, and one-quarter snored more than half the time. Similarly, one quarter of children had 2 or more GI symptoms. Children with positive sleep-disordered breathing scores were 2.22 times as likely to have 2 or more GI symptoms in the past month after confounder adjustment (95% confidence interval = 1.39-3.55). In particular, this relationship appeared to be driven by daytime sleepiness, as children with sleepiness had about a 2-fold higher prevalence of 2 or more GI symptoms (adjusted prevalence ratio = 1.96, 95% confidence interval = 1.18-3.26). Neither snoring nor sleep duration were associated with GI symptoms.

Keywords: bowel; eating problems; sleep-disordered breathing; sleepiness; snoring; stomach.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Conflicting Interests: None of the authors have any conflicts of interest with the work presented.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Distribution of the number of GI symptoms reported per child.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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