CHU de Caen, Service de Psychiatrie de l'enfant et de l'adolescent, Avenue Clemenceau, Caen F-14000, France.
Sleep Med Rev. 2011 Dec;15(6):379-87. doi: 10.1016/j.smrv.2011.02.001. Epub 2011 Mar 9.
Sleep disturbance is common in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and melatonin is widely prescribed in such cases despite a lack of guidelines. The aim of this paper is to provide a systematic review of efficacy and safety of exogenous melatonin for treating disordered sleep in individuals with ASD. We performed a Pubmed(®) documentary search enlarged by a manual review of references, which finally supplied 12 citations (4 case reports, 3 retrospective studies, 2 open-label clinical trials, and 3 placebo-controlled trials). As a whole, we found that the literature supports the existence of a beneficial effect of melatonin on sleep in individuals with ASD, with only few and minor side effects. However, considering the small number of studies and their methodological limits, these conclusions cannot yet be regarded as evidence-based. Randomized controlled trials and long-term follow-up data are still lacking to better assess efficacy and safety of exogenous melatonin for disordered sleep in individuals with ASD.
睡眠障碍在自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）中很常见，尽管缺乏指导方针，但褪黑素在这种情况下被广泛开处。本文旨在对自闭症谱系障碍患者使用外源性褪黑素治疗睡眠障碍的疗效和安全性进行系统评价。我们进行了 Pubmed（®）文献检索，并通过手动查阅参考文献进行了扩充，最终提供了 12 篇参考文献（4 篇病例报告、3 项回顾性研究、2 项开放标签临床试验和 3 项安慰剂对照试验）。总的来说，我们发现文献支持褪黑素对 ASD 患者睡眠有有益影响，仅有少数且轻微的副作用。然而，考虑到研究数量较少且存在方法学限制，这些结论尚不能被视为基于证据的结论。目前仍缺乏随机对照试验和长期随访数据，无法更好地评估外源性褪黑素治疗 ASD 患者睡眠障碍的疗效和安全性。
