Introduction: Sleep is an important aspect in maintaining circadian rhythm and plays an important role in maintaining health. Sleep disturbances and poor sleep quality are prevalent complaints in people with inflammatory arthritis and may exacerbate pain in this population, potentially leading to reduced levels of physical activity (PA).
Methods: Members from Arthritis Ireland were invited to participate in a cross-sectional survey hosted on SurveyMonkey(R)TM. Descriptive statistics, Chi-square tests/Fisher’s exact tests were used to analyse the data using SPSS v22.
Results: Ninety (90) people with Inflammatory Arthritis responded and report an average of 5.7 (SD 1.46) hours sleep per night. Mean number of years with condition 10.09 (SD 9.92). Majority (61%) report sleep quality as fairly bad/very bad, with 31% taking medications at least once a week to help sleep. Majority report ‘pain’ (95%), ‘waking up in the middle of the night or early morning’ (97%) and ‘cannot get to sleep within 30 minutes’ (91%) as disturbances. Statistically significant association between longer years with symptoms (p=0.004), taking medication at least once a week (p=0.009) and limited in their activities (p=0.004), when rating their sleep quality as bad. PA levels were a low 1,210 minutes per week, compared to other physical activity surveys from their healthy counterparts, even-though 72% believe it is important to measure PA.
Conclusions: People with Inflammatory Arthritis fall below the ‘sleep needs spectrum’ with those having symptoms longer, taking medications regularly and having limitations with their activities, reporting poorer sleep quality. Research needed to investigate poor sleep quality and disturbances in order to promote health and well-being in people with Inflammatory Arthritis. Effects of PA activity interventions on poor sleep needs to be examined to show if it is a positive non-pharmacological treatment approach for the management of poor sleep in patients with Inflammatory arthritis.
