Sleep Quality and Factors Affect It in Caregivers of People with Dementia: A Cross-sectional Study

Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the sleep quality of caregivers of people with dementia (PwD) and the factors affecting it.Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study design was used. A total of 119 home-dwelling PwD and their primary caregivers were recruited from February-July 2019. Socio-demographic characteristics form, Pittsburg sleep quality, mini mental state examination (MMSE), neuropsychiatric inventory (NPI), activities of daily Living (ADL) and instrumental ADL (IADL), perceived stress scale (PSS), caregiver burden inventory (CBI), Beck depression inventory (BDI), and Charlson comorbidity index (CCI) were used. Descriptive statistics, t-test, Pearson's correlation and multinominal regression analysis were performed using SPSS version 25.0.Results: The sleep quality of the caregivers was poor (10.70 +/- 3.663). Patients' MMSE, NPI, ADL and IADL; caregivers' PSS, CBI, BDI, and CCI together were a significant predictor of caregiver sleep quality (F=17.020; p<0.001). Eight variables together account for 55% of the variance in sleep quality. Predictive order of importance of variables on caregiver sleep quality was in the form of CCI (0=-0.396), BDI (0=0.292), MMSE score (0=-0.284), NPI (0=-0.239), PSS (0=0.196), CBI (0=0.108), ADL (0=-0.080), and IADL (0=0.052).Conclusion: By determining the sleep quality and factors affecting of caregivers, it is considered that the caregivers will provide an opportunity for projects that will increase the sleep quality interventionally. Interventions to reduce caregiver depression, stress and burden can improve caregiver sleep quality; in addition, it is suggested that they will contribute to the sleep quality of caregivers in their attempts to improve the behavioral and cognitive functions of PwD.