Decreased Arousals Among Healthy Infants After Short-Term Sleep Deprivation

Abstract

Short-term sleep deprivation among infants is associated with the development of obstructive sleep apnea and significant increases in arousal thresholds. As already reported, sleep deprivation may induce effects on respiratory control mechanisms, leading to impairment of ventilatory and arousal responses to chemical stimulation and decreases in genioglossal electromyographic activity during REM sleep. These changes in respiratory control mechanisms could contribute to the development of obstructive apnea. The relationship between the development of obstructive apnea and increases in arousal thresholds remains to be evaluated. Adult subjects with obstructive sleep apnea exhibited both sleep fragmentation and increases in arousal thresholds. Conversely, sleep deprivation increased the frequency and severity of obstructive sleep apnea. In this study, the increases in arousal thresholds and the development of obstructive apnea seemed to result from the preceding sleep deprivation. The depressed arousals that follow sleep deprivation have been attributed to central mechanisms, rather than decreases in peripheral sensory organ function. Such mechanisms could include disturbances within the reticular formation of the brainstem, which integrates specific facilitory inputs, such as ascending pathways from auditory receptors, and inhibitory inputs from the cortex. It remains to be determined whether the combination of upper airway obstruction and depressed arousability from sleep contributes to the increased risk of sudden death reported for sleep-deprived infants.

Apneic preterms and methylxanthines: arousal deficits, sleep fragmentation and suppressed spontaneous movements

“…However, long-term methylxanthine treatment in our study promoted sleep fragmentation, as reflected in both state and actigraphic results, and lowered arousal parameters including the vigor of spontaneous movements during sleep. Movement suppression during sleep and increased apneic events has been reported recently in experimentally sleep-deprived, normal infants, 16 and is consistent with earlier reports of arousal suppression associated with sleep deprivation. 24,25 Nonetheless, developmental neurotoxic sequelae from early methylxanthine pharmacotherapy in sleep-wake state properties has not been well studied.…”

Inhibition of Serotonergic Neurons in the Nucleus Paragigantocellularis Lateralis Fragments Sleep and Decreases Rapid Eye Movement Sleep in the Piglet: Implications for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome

“…Prolonged deep periods of recovery sleep might also increase the risk of obstructive sleep apnea (Simpson, 2001). REM sleep deprivation in adult humans and animals has been found to cause many behavioral changes (Dement, 1960;Koller et al, 1969), and brief periods of sleep deprivation in infants alters the autonomic control of heart rate (Franco et al, 2003) and decrease arousals (Franco et al, 2004).…”

Arousal from sleep in response to intermittent hypoxia in rat pups is modulated by medullary raphe GABAergic mechanisms

“…Spontaneous arousals and those in response to exogenous stimuli are affected by many factors: sleep position (3,29,37), sleep efficiency (30), prenatal exposure to cigarette smoking (28,38), and stage of development (39). It has been hypothesized that arousal impairment may play an important role in the etiology of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) (32,40,43,46).…”