The Longitudinal and Cross-Sectional Associations of Grief and Complicated Grief With Sleep Quality in Older Adults.

OBJECTIVE/BACKGROUND: About 15% of grievers experience complicated grief. We determined cross-sectional and longitudinal relations of grief and complicated grief with sleep duration and quality in the general population of elderly adults.

PARTICIPANTS

We included 5,421 men and women from the prospective population-based Rotterdam Study.

METHODS

The Inventory of Complicated Grief was used to define grief and complicated grief. We assessed sleep with the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index.

RESULTS

After 6 years, 3,511 (80% of survivors) underwent the follow-up interview. Complicated grief was cross-sectionally associated with shorter sleep duration and lower sleep quality. These associations were explained by the presence of depressive symptoms. The prospective analyses showed that sleep duration and sleep quality did not decline further during follow-up of persons who experienced grief or complicated grief.

CONCLUSION

In community-dwelling, middle-aged and older adults, persons with normal and complicated grief had both a shorter sleep duration and a lower sleep quality, mainly explained by depressive symptoms. However, prospective analyses showed that sleep quality and sleep duration do not decline further in persons with normal grief and complicated grief.