Polysomnographic Aging in Normal Elderly Egyptians

Polysomnographic Aging in Normal Elderly Egyptians

El-Kholy S, Hasanin A, Hosny H, Mostafa S, El Shazly N, El-Gohary A, Samir S

Egypt J. Neurol. Psychiat. Neurosurg. Vol. 46 (2) - July 2009

Saly El-Kholy1, Adel Hasanin2, Hanan Hosny3, Shahira Mostafa1, Nihal El Shazly1, Amira El Gohary1, Shaimaa Samir 3

Background

Sleep disturbances interfere with all aspects of health and daily life. With aging, there are prominent sleep changes. Objectives: The aim of our work is to study polysomnographic changes in normal elderly Egyptians in relation to adult control group.

Methods

This work was carried out on a group of 20 healthy elderly Egyptians (above 60 years), with a comparison group of adults (20-32 years). The history of sleep characteristics and patterns was evaluated. Radiological and laboratory tests were run as a routine part of the examination, and finally, an overnight polysomnography was performed to all subjects to analyze their sleep, to score all the sleep stages, and to detect any sleep disturbance.

Results

The study revealed that sleep of the elderly becomes lighter with decreased percentage of slow wave sleep or deep sleep from the total sleep time. Sleep apnea/hypopnea syndrome was the most prevalent sleep disorder among the elderly subjects (90%); the interesting point is that the disorder was present even when the subject had no sleep complaint. Periodic limb movement disorder was also common among the subjects (25%) and all of the examined subjects were unaware of the disorder. Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep behavior disorder could not be detected in the study sample. In conclusion, by means of polysomnographic recording, many physiological changes in sleep were proved to occur with aging.

(Egypt J. Neurol. Psychiat. Neurosurg., 2009, 46(2): 421-429)

Key words

polysomnography; sleep apnea/hypopnea syndrome; periodic limb movement disorder; REM sleep behavior disorder

http://www.ejnpn.org/Article/DetailsInfo.aspx?Id=481