Meditation helps you feel calm, and relaxed, regulate your emotions better, and overcome distressing situations. It can also help to regulate sleep quality in a big way. In a clinical trial comparing meditation to a structured program focusing on changing poor sleep habits and establishing a bedtime routine, mindfulness meditation practices resulted in improved sleep quality for older adults with moderate sleep disturbances.
The aging population of a country raises medical and public health concerns about sleep disruptions. It is believed that 50% of those 55 years of age and older struggle with sleep issues.
According to the study backdrop, older persons with moderate sleep problems had higher levels of exhaustion, disturbed mood, including depressive symptoms, and a lower quality of life.
Mindfulness awareness meditation and Sleep Quality
A modest clinical trial was done in Los Angeles in 2012 by David S. Black, Ph.D., M.P.H., of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, and coauthors. 49 participants (average age 66) were included in the analysis. Twenty-four participants in the standardized mindful awareness practices (MAPs) intervention and twenty-five participants in the sleep hygiene education (SHE) intervention comprised the trial.
The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), a popular self-reported sleep disruption questionnaire, was utilized to compare the groups’ differences.
Compared to the SHE group, the MAPs group’s participants demonstrated progress.
The average PSQI values for the MAPs group were 10.2 at baseline and 7.4 following the intervention.
The study’s findings indicate that the SHE group’s average PSQIs were 10.2 at baseline and 9.1 following the intervention.
In addition, the MAPs group outperformed the SHE groups on secondary measures of depressive symptoms, fatigue interference, sleeplessness symptoms, and fatigue intensity.
In contrast, there were no differences observed in the groups’ levels of stress, anxiety, or inflammatory signaling—all of which decreased with time in both groups.
Mindfulness Meditation helps in remediating sleep disturbances
“According to our findings, mindfulness meditation appears to have a role in addressing the prevalent burden of sleep problems among older adults by remediating their moderate sleep disturbances and deficits in daytime functioning, with short-term effect sizes commensurate with the status quo of clinical treatment approaches for sleep problems. … Given that standardized mindfulness programs are readily delivered in many communities, dissemination efforts do not serve as a barrier in this instance. … Pending future replication of these findings, structured mindfulness mediation training appears to have at least some clinical usefulness to remediate moderate sleep problems and sleep-related daytime impairment in older adults,” the study concludes.
Being Mindful of Later-Life Sleep Quality
In a related commentary, Adam P. Spira, Ph.D., of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, writes: “As the authors explain, effective nonpharmacological interventions that are both ‘scalable’ and ‘community accessible’ are needed to improve disturbed sleep and prevent clinical levels of insomnia. This is imperative given the links between insomnia and poor health outcomes, the risks of sleep medication use, and the limited availability of health care professionals trained in effective nondrug treatments such as behaviour therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia. This context makes the positive results of this RCT [randomized clinical trial] compelling.”
“This excellent study raises some questions that need to be answered in future research,” Spira continues.
“In summary, Black et al are to be applauded for their intriguing study. Other community-based nonpharmacological interventions are needed that improve sleep and perhaps prevent insomnia among older adults. Such interventions may have a key role in safely reducing the morbidity associated with disturbed sleep in later life,” Spira concludes.
Story Source:
Materials provided by The JAMA Network Journals. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
Journal References:
David S. Black, Gillian A. O’Reilly, Richard Olmstead, Elizabeth C. Breen, Michael R. Irwin. Mindfulness Meditation and Improvement in Sleep Quality and Daytime Impairment Among Older Adults With Sleep Disturbances. JAMA Internal Medicine, 2015; DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.8081
Adam P. Spira. Being Mindful of Later-Life Sleep Quality and Its Potential Role in Prevention. JAMA Internal Medicine, 2015; DOI: 10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.8093
Page citation:
The JAMA Network Journals. “Mindfulness meditation appears to help improve sleep quality.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 16 February 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/02/150216131115.htm>.
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