Assessment of sleep in women with night eating syndrome.
OBJECTIVE
Evaluation of sleep in subjects with night eating syndrome (NES).


METHODS
Polysomnographic and questionnaire comparisons between subjects with NES and controls.


METHODS
Fifteen women with NES (mean +/- SD = 41 +/- 8 years) and 14 women (comparable age and weight) without NES (39 +/- 10 years) were studied in the laboratory for 3 days.


METHODS
N/A.


RESULTS
Subjects with NES did not differ from controls in timing of sleep onset or offset. They had less stage 2 sleep than controls (minutes, p = .012; percentage, p = .016) and less stage 3 sleep (p = .023), which contributed to their having a lower total sleep time (p = .05) and reduced sleep efficiency (p = .03). Subjects with NES did not have more awakenings than controls, but 93.3% of them ate on awakening during all 3 nights, while 92.9% of controls did not eat on any night. Logistic discriminant analyses identified a multiple sleep parameter model associated with increased likelihood of NES that had sensitivity of 84.6% and specificity of 76.9%. Patients with NES were more depressed than controls (p < .001) and reported greater sleep disturbance that included lower sleep quality (p < or = .001), reduced sleep duration (p < or = .001), and increased number of awakenings (p < or = .001).


CONCLUSIONS
Patients with NES appear to have sleep maintenance insomnia rather than sleep-related eating disorder or a parasomnia. The maintenance of normal timing for sleep-wake behavior in the presence of a phase delay in the timing of caloric intake suggests this disorder reflects a state of internal circadian desynchrony associated with significant sleep complaints. It remains unknown whether the sleep disturbance precedes the abnormally timed eating.
Rogers
Naomi L
NL
Division of Sleep and Chronobiology, Department of Psychiatry, The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia 19104-021, USA.
Dinges
David F
DF
Allison
Kelly C
KC
Maislin
Greg
G
Martino
Nicole
N
O'Reardon
John P
JP
Stunkard
Albert J
AJ
D000328:Adult; D015992:Body Mass Index; D002940:Circadian Rhythm; D003863:Depression / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D017286:Polysomnography; D012894:Sleep Stages / Q000502:physiology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires