What is a Sleep Disorder?

A sleep disorder is a condition that impacts the quality of your sleep. Current research tells us that disordered sleep has a significant impact on health and function.

There are many sleep disorders. These include insomnia (difficulty falling or staying asleep), sleep apnea (abnormal patterns of breathing during sleep), restless leg syndrome (a sleep movement disorder), narcolepsy (falling asleep suddenly during the day), and circadian rhythm sleep disorders (poor synchronization with sleep-wake and light-dark cycles).

Many diagnoses impact upon sleep. For example, PTSD may result in nightmares and disrupt sleep and may result in a fear of sleep, anxiety disorders and/or stress responses may result in racing thoughts that block sleep onset, brain injury may impact sleep cycles, chronic pain may result in wakefulness and difficulty staying asleep, and depression may result in excessive sleep.