2014 Volume 17 Issue 2 Pages 53-59
Purpose : This study aimed to elucidate the relationship between chronic stress and sleep disorder in family caregivers living with frail elderly.
Method and Results: The subjects were 36 family caregivers living with home-care elderly. A selfadministered survey was conducted and their salivar y samples were collected. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was used for sleep evaluation. Subjective evaluation, salivary cortisol, and secretory immunoglobulin A in saliva salivary (s-IgA) were used as indices for chronic stress. The stress score increased significantly as the PSQI score increased (β＝ 0.434, p ＝ 0.014). The log s-IgA value decreased significantly as the PSQI score increased (β＝− 0.411, p ＝ 0.031).
Conclusion : Increase in subjective stress and decrease in salivary s-IgA were significantly associated with sleep disorder in family caregivers living with frail elderly. Chronic stress increased with increased disturbance of sleep in family caregivers. The results suggest that improvement of sleep might lead to alleviation of chronic stress in family caregivers.
