Home » Medical and Psychiatric Conditions Medical and psychiatric sleep disorders are sleep disorders associated with medical and psychiatric conditions.

The ones with medical conditions are:

• Alcoholism dependency and abuse commonly disturb sleep. After half an hour of alcohol drinking consumption, subjective sleepiness rises and stays high for four hours. Then, sleep become fragmented as the fallen alcohol level increases arousals. When alcoholics abstain from drinking alcohol, sleep can be significantly disrupted, and the short episodes of sleep they do get are often marked by nightmares and other anxiety dreams.
• Sleeping sickness ( Gambina trypanosomiasis, African sleeping sickness) is a chronic protozoan brain infection that produces excessive sleepiness.
• Nocturnal cardiac ischemia are chest pains due to atherosclerotic heart disease that keep the sleeper awake at night.
• In Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease , lung or bronchial problems that inhibit lung function (say emphysema) can cause grave insomnia.
• Asthma attacks during sleep usually wakes up the sleeper.
• In sleep-related gastroesophageal reflux, the person wakes up from sleep with heartburn or a sour taste in the mouth. This is on account os some of the stomach contents having been regurgitated into the esophagus during the night.
• In Peptic Ulcer, the pain of ulcers can waken the person frequently during the night.
• Fibrositis syndrome ( fibromalgia, fibromyositis) syndrome is characterized by diffused muscle and bone pain, chronic daytime fatigue and unrefreshing sleep at night.
• Sleep problems associated with neurological disorders are degenerative brain disorders
• Cerebral degenerative disorders like Alzheimer's disease,Huntington's disease, Parkinson's disease, Pick's disease, ALS and others can disrupt sleep at night. Fatal familial insomnia is a rare, inherited degenerative disorder that begins with sleep troubles and progresses within a few months to a total lack of sleep, and then death.
• Sleep epilepsy are epileptic seizures that can be found in either sleep or wakefulness and there are some types that are found mostly in sleep. These seizures upset sleep. Sleep-related headaches can strike during sleep. In some people, sleep headaches are more common than waking headaches.

The above completes the medical part of the medical and psychiatric conditions associated with psychiatric disorders

• Psychoses such as schizophrenia and those that are drug-induced are characterized by hallucinations, delusions, catatonic behavior, incoherence or inappropriate emotions. Excessive sleepiness or Insomnia is also common in individuals suffering from such psychoses.
• Mood disorders include depression, hypomania and mania. Insomnia is often the result, but excessive sleepiness can also occur.
• Anxiety disorders are characterized by surprisingly great anxiety and avoidance of whatever seems to cause it. Anxiety disorders can create sleep-maintenance insomnia or sleep-onset association disorders.
• Panic disorder are phobias such as the common one of claustrophobia - fear of enclosed spaces or agoraphobia - fear of open spaces etc. . Extreme anxiety and fear occurs suddenly and panic episodes awaken people from sleep.

With this, we complete the medical and psychiatric conditions associated with sleep disorder.