The prevalence of sleep disorders during childhood has been estimated to range from 25 to 43 %. The aim of this review is to determine the prevalence of sleep disorders and possible associations with chronic kidney disease (CKD)-related factors and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in children with CKD. An electronic systematic literature search for sleep disorders in children with CKD in Pubmed, Embase and the Cochrane Library Databases identified seven relevant articles for review, all of which reported an increased prevalence of sleep disorders in children with CKD. Five studies included children with CKD undergoing dialysis, and two studies included only non-dialysis patients. In all studies the presence of sleep disturbances was assessed by questionnaires; only one study compared the results of a validated questionnaire with laboratory-based polysomnography. The prevalence of any sleep disorder ranged from 77 to 85 % in dialysis patients, to 32-50 % in transplanted patients and 40-50 % in non-dialysis patients. The most commonly studied disorder was restless legs syndrome, which presented at a prevalence of 10-35 %. Three studies showed significant associations between presence of sleep disorders and HRQOL. We found consistent evidence of an increased prevalence of sleep disturbances in children with CKD, and these seemed to play a critical role in HRQOL.
Keywords: Children; Chronic kidney disease; Daytime sleepiness; Health-related quality of life; Restless legs syndrome; Sleep.