Sleep Disorder-Night Terrors Disorder
Sleep terrors are classified as a parasomnia — an undesirable behavior or experience during sleep. Sleep terrors are a disorder of arousal, meaning they occur during N3 sleep, the deepest stage of non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep. Another NREM disorder is sleepwalking, which can occur together with sleep terrors.
Cluster Number:
Wiki Number: PW205
Diagnosis: Sleep Terror Disorder
US Patients: 36.9% at 18 months but 19.7% at 30 months; in adults, 2.2%
World Patients:
Sex Ratio: B+; G; adults, no difference
Age Onset: at age 3½, one per week; frequency tapers off
Brain Area: high voltages in electroencephalography, higher heart rate and muscle tone; frontal lobe epilepsy, thalamic lesions,
Symptoms: 1-10 minutes in the first 3-4 hours of non-REM (early) sleep; usually happen in delta (slow-wave) sleep.
Progression: sit up and yell, time of autonomic arousal (speed-up)seem awake but are confused, sleepwalking, low blood sugar
Causes: PTSD, mental disorders, generalized anxiety disorder, higher frequency among relatives, asthma, constricted nasal passages
Medications: tricyclic antidepressants, benzodiazepines
Therapies: Children usually do not need treatment, diminish with age. Hypnosis may help. Better sleep habits.
Youtube Video:
Five Nights at Freddy’s
Youtube Video:
How to Stop Night Terrors
Amazon or Library Book: The Nightmare Dictionary
Click the book to link or order from Amazon.
4 CURRENT ARTICLES
FROM PUBMED
The world-wide medical research
reports chosen for each diagnosis
Clicking each title opens the
PubMed article’s summary-abstract.
- Fever-induced acute sleep terrors in children and adolescents following SARS-CoV-2 infectionby Xiaoli Wang on April 30, 2024
CONCLUSION: SARS-CoV-2 infection may precipitate acute sleep terrors in children and adolescents. The course of these sleep terrors is generally benign, with all patients achieving spontaneous complete remission over time.
- Recent studies about the underlying cerebral mechanism of the fearfull arousals from slow wave sleepby Péter Halász on March 19, 2024
We consider the disorders of arousal and sleep-related hypermotor epilepsy as genetic twin-conditions, one without, one with epilepsy. They share an augmented arousal-activity during NREM sleep with sleep-wake dissociations, culminating in sleep terrors and sleep-related hypermotor seizures with similar symptoms. The known mutations underlying the two spectra are different, but there are multifold population-genetic-, family- and even individual (the two conditions occurring in the same person)...
- A population-based study exploring association of parasomnia symptoms with sleep onset delay among school-aged childrenby Ruoyu Lu on March 9, 2024
CONCLUSIONS: Parasomnia symptoms were associated with a higher risk of sleep onset delay independently of sleep duration among children. More studies are needed to enrich the current evidence, thus further clarifying the association and interaction among different sleep parameters.
- Educational Resources to Support Patients with Parasomniasby Courtney D Molina on February 17, 2024
This article serves to help reduce patient burden in searching for credible information about parasomnias-abnormal behaviors during sleep-including sleepwalking, night terrors, and rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder. It exhibits a compiled list of accessible online resources about parasomnias as well as detailed descriptions about each resource. By increasing patient accessibility to clinically validated resources, patients are more empowered to take an active role in managing their...