Subjective Assessment of Sleep in Infantile Autism: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Sleep disturbances are very common in children with autism; it is for this reason that instruments that facilitate their evaluation are necessary. Objectives: Perform sleep assessment from a subjective perspective in a group of children with primary autism and compare them with a control group, using the Sleep Habits in Children Survey (CSHQ), with the purpose of determining sleep disturbances according to the subscales used. Method: A prospective cross-sectional study was conducted in a group of 21 patients with primary autism. For the evaluation of sleep disturbances, we chose the CSHQ survey. The differences between the independent groups were calculated by applying a Mann⁻Whitney U test. Results: In the group of children with autism, higher values of the total scale were observed in comparison with the control group (p = 0.00) which It is congruent with a large sleep dysfunction. Significant differences were observed for all subscales (p = 0.00), with the exception of the subscale number 7. Conclusions: A high presence of sleep disturbances was observed in children with primary autism, with the exception of sleep breathing disorders, which did not show significant differences between the groups.

Keywords

• Subjective sleep assessment
• Autism spectrum disorder
• REM sleep
• NREM sleep