Excessive daytime sleepiness after traumatic brain injury

ABSTRACT

Study Objectives

To identify the prevalence of excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) in a prospectively recruited patient population with traumatic brain injury (TBI) of mixed severity. Furthermore, the study aimed to assess the relationship between patient factors and EDS.

Method

One-hundred and eighteen patients with TBI were assessed in a neurorehabilitation clinic after discharge from the emergency department. Enrolled participants were evaluated using several TBI-related outcome measures, 6–8 weeks after injury.

Results

EDS (defined using the Epworth Sleepiness Scale ≥10) occurred in 48 of 118 (41.7%) patients in this study. Anxiety; depression; change in ability to work; employment status; global outcome (GOSE); social and functional outcome (RHFUQ); and symptom severity (RPCS) were associated with EDS in a univariate analysis. Anxiety was the only factor associated with EDS in the multivariate analysis (OR: 0.28 [95% CI: 0.09–0.90], P = .032).

Conclusion

EDS is common after TBI in a community setting and is associated with several factors, which likely interact to contribute toward worse outcome. Anxiety is a factor that, if routinely assessed and considered during patient care choices, may assist in favorable sleep-related outcome during and after post-TBI recovery.

KEYWORDS:

• Traumatic brain injury
• excessive daytime sleepiness
• anxiety
• epworth sleepiness scale

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the study participants for their contribution to the study. We also thank the Sheffield Institute for Translational Neuroscience (SITraN) for their support.

Disclosure of interest

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, TC, upon reasonable request. http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/wg2n5z7h7z.1#file-1c25257b-35bc-4a7a-9cfc-a9d817b2c092