Dataset Information

Sleep and Psychological Difficulties in Italian School-Age Children During COVID-19 Lockdown.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

On March 10, 2020, the Italian Government ordered a national lockdown to limit the viral transmission of coronavirus disease 2019 infections. This study investigated how these restrictive measures have impacted sleep quality, timing, and psychological difficulties in school-age children and their mothers during the lockdown.

Methods

In an online survey, 299 mothers reported their sleep habits, experience of time, and psychological difficulties as well as those of their children (6-10?years old) during and, retrospectively, before the lockdown.

Results

During the lockdown, children showed a marked delay in sleep timing-that is, later bedtime and rise time-and a mild worsening in sleep quality. They were less prone to respect daily routines or to keep track of the passage of time. They showed increased emotional, conduct, and hyperactive symptoms, and the increase in these psychological difficulties was predicted by the change in sleep quality, boredom, and mothers' psychological difficulties. In addition, mothers showed a delayed sleep timing and worsening of sleep quality during the lockdown, in varying degrees depending on their working conditions. Mothers who kept working regularly outside their homes during lockdown reported more regular sleep patterns, whereas mothers who stopped working showed more emotional symptoms and relevant changes in their perception of time.

Conclusions

Overall, given the evidence of the adverse behavioral and psychological impact of home confinement and social restrictions, effective measures needed to be in place to mitigate long-term effects on children and their mothers, especially those who have had to stop working during lockdown.

SUBMITTER: Cellini N

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7928801 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Sleep and Psychological Difficulties in Italian School-Age Children During COVID-19 Lockdown.

Cellini Nicola N Di Giorgio Elisa E Mioni Giovanna G Di Riso Daniela D

Journal of pediatric psychology 20210201 2

<h4>Objective</h4>On March 10, 2020, the Italian Government ordered a national lockdown to limit the viral transmission of coronavirus disease 2019 infections. This study investigated how these restrictive measures have impacted sleep quality, timing, and psychological difficulties in school-age children and their mothers during the lockdown.<h4>Methods</h4>In an online survey, 299 mothers reported their sleep habits, experience of time, and psychological difficulties as well as those of their c ...[more]

PMID: 33517438

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Project description:Italy was the first western hotspot of the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to contain the spread of the virus, the Italian Government imposed home confinement to the entire population for almost two months. The present study is the first large-scale longitudinal report of the sleep and mental health changes during the prolonged lockdown due to the COVID-19 outbreak. We focused on the gendered vulnerability in a sample of the Italian population since cross-sectional research identified women to be more at-risk than men during this unprecedented situation. 2701 individuals (mean age?±?standard deviation, 32.37?±?11.62; range, 18-82) participated in a web-based longitudinal survey consisting of two measurements. Participants were first-time recruited on social networks and via telephone messages through a snowball sampling and tested during the third week of the lockdown period. Subsequently, a follow-up evaluation was carried out during the seventh week of lockdown. The survey assessed perceived stress, sleep quality, insomnia and depression symptoms, and anxiety, using the following questionnaires: the 10-item Perceived Stress Scale, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, the Insomnia Severity Index, the Beck Depression Inventory-second edition, and the State-Anxiety Inventory. Women showed the worst condition for all the examined dimensions in both the assessments. Nevertheless, at the follow-up women reported a reduction in perceived stress, insomnia and depression severity symptoms, and anxiety. On the other hand, male participants showed a worsening of perceived stress, sleep quality, and insomnia symptoms. Consequently, the gender prevalence gap of clinical conditions such as insomnia and depression was largely reduced under lockdown. Our investigation pointed to a different time course of sleep and mental health between genders during the home confinement period. Women seemed to show greater long-term resilience during the lockdown. Meanwhile, the male gender emerges as the most vulnerable category to the extension of the restraining measures. Our results suggest that there is no "weaker gender" after a prolonged lockdown. Indeed, the Italian population transversely presented signs of psychological suffering and significant sleep disturbances after the protracted and stressful lockdown period due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Project description:ObjectiveTo identify COVID-19 work-related stressors and experiences associated with sleep difficulties in HCW, and to assess the role of depression and traumatic stress in this association.MethodsA cross-sectional study of HCW using self-report questionnaires, during the first peak of the pandemic in Israel (April 2020), conducted in a large tertiary medical center in Israel. Study population included 189 physicians and nurses working in designated COVID-19 wards and a comparison group of 643 HCW. Mean age of the total sample was 41.7 ± 11.1, 67% were female, 42.1% physicians, with overall mean number of years of professional experience 14.2 ± 20. The exposure was working in COVID-19 wards and related specific stressors and negative experiences. Primary outcome measurement was the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI). Secondary outcomes included the Primary Care-Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Screen (PC-PTSD-5); the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) for depression; the anxiety module of the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS); Pandemic-Related Stress Factors (PRSF) and witnessing patient suffering and death.ResultsCompared with non-COVID-19 HCW, COVID-19 HCW were more likely to be male (41.3% vs. 30.7%) and younger (36.91 ± 8.81 vs. 43.14 ± 11.35 years). COVID-19 HCW reported higher prevalence of sleep difficulties: 63% vs. 50.7% in the non-COVID group (OR 1.62, 95% CI 1.15-2.29, p = 0.006), mostly difficulty maintaining sleep: 26.5% vs. 18.5% (OR 1.65, 95% CI 1.11-2.44, p = 0.012). Negative COVID-19 work-related experiences, specifically witnessing patient physical suffering and death, partially explained the association. Although past psychological problems and current depression and PTSD were associated with difficulty maintaining sleep, the main association remained robust also after controlling for those conditions in the full model.Conclusion and relevanceCOVID-19 frontline HCW were more likely to report sleep difficulties, mainly difficulty maintaining sleep, as compared with non-COVID-19 HCW working at the same hospital. Negative patient-care related experiences likely mediated the increased probability for those difficulties. Future research is needed to elucidate the long-term trajectories of sleep difficulties among HCW during large scale outbreaks, and to identify risk factors for their persistence.

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Dataset Information

Sleep and Psychological Difficulties in Italian School-Age Children During COVID-19 Lockdown.

Objective

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Sleep and Psychological Difficulties in Italian School-Age Children During COVID-19 Lockdown.

Similar Datasets

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