Scientific Reports (Nov 2022)

Preterm toddlers have low nighttime sleep quality and high daytime activity

  • Yoko Asaka,
  • Yusuke Mitani,
  • Hidenobu Ohta,
  • Takayo Nakazawa,
  • Rika Fukutomi,
  • Kyoko Kobayashi,
  • Mayuko Kumagai,
  • Hitomi Shinohara,
  • Michiko Yoshida,
  • Akiko Ando,
  • Yuko Yoshimura,
  • Machiko Nakagawa,
  • Yoshihisa Oishi,
  • Masato Mizushima,
  • Hiroyuki Adachi,
  • Yosuke Kaneshi,
  • Keita Morioka,
  • Yoshitaka Seto,
  • Rinshu Shimabukuro,
  • Michio Hirata,
  • Takashi Ikeda,
  • Miwa Ozawa,
  • Masahiro Takeshima,
  • Atsushi Manabe,
  • Tsutomu Takahashi,
  • Kazuo Mishima,
  • Mitsuru Kikuchi,
  • Hitoshi Yoda,
  • Isao Kusakawa,
  • Kazutoshi Cho

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-24338-8
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 12, no. 1
pp. 1 – 8

Abstract

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Abstract A number of studies have been made on the sleep characteristics of children born preterm in an attempt to develop methods to address the sleep problems commonly observed among such children. However, the reported sleep characteristics from these studies vary depending on the observation methods used, i.e., actigraphy, polysomnography and questionnaire. In the current study, to obtain reliable data on the sleep characteristics of preterm-born children, we investigated the difference in sleep properties between 97 preterm and 97 term toddlers of approximately 1.5 years of age using actigraphy. Actigraphy units were attached to the toddlers’ waists with an adjustable elastic belt for 7 consecutive days, and a child sleep diary was completed by their parents. In the study, we found that preterm toddlers had more nocturnal awakenings and more daytime activity, suggesting that preterm-born children may have a different process of sleep development in their early development.