Subjective Poor Sleep Quality is Associated with Higher Blood Pressure and Prevalent Hypertension in General Population Independent of Sleep Disordered Breathing

Zhikang Yang; Mulalibieke Heizhati; Lin Wang; Mei Li; Fengyu Pan; Zhongrong Wang; Reyila Abudureyimu; Jing Hong; Ling Yao; Wenbo Yang; Shasha Liu; Nanfang Li

doi:10.2147/NSS.S329024

Subjective Poor Sleep Quality is Associated with Higher Blood Pressure and Prevalent Hypertension in General Population Independent of Sleep Disordered Breathing

Nat Sci Sleep. 2021 Oct 8:13:1759-1770. doi: 10.2147/NSS.S329024. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Zhikang Yang^#^{1

2

3}, Mulalibieke Heizhati^#^{1

2

3}, Lin Wang^{1

2

3}, Mei Li^{1

2

3}, Fengyu Pan^{1

2

3}, Zhongrong Wang^{1

2

3}, Reyila Abudureyimu^{1

2

3}, Jing Hong^{1

2

3}, Ling Yao^{1

2

3}, Wenbo Yang^{1

2

3}, Shasha Liu^{1

2

3}, Nanfang Li^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Hypertension Center, People's Hospital of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, Urumqi, Xinjiang, People's Republic of China.
² Xinjiang Hypertension Institute, Urumqi, Xinjiang, People's Republic of China.
³ National Health Committee Key Laboratory of Hypertension Clinical Research, Urumqi, Xinjiang, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Objective: To explore the relationship of subjective sleep quality with blood pressure (BP) and hypertension by considering the influence of sleep disordered breathing (SDB) and age in the general population.

Methods: We evaluated sleep quality using the Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI) and SDB using NoSAS score and measured BP in randomly selected adults in China in 2019. Sleep quality is categorized into four groups as very good, fairly good, fairly bad and very bad. SDB is defined as NoSAS score ≥8. Hypertension is defined as systolic BP ≥140 mmHg and/or diastolic BP ≥90 mmHg, and/or use of antihypertensive medicine within previous 2 weeks. Multi-variable linear and logistic regression analyses were used to assess the association of global PSQI score and sleep quality with BP and prevalent hypertension.

Results: In the 33,341 participants (53.4% women, median age: 48 years), prevalence of hypertension significantly increased from very good to very bad sleepers in total (34.3 vs 42.6 vs 50.3 vs 58.5%), SDB (61.2 vs 68.3 vs 73.3 vs 75.5%) and non-SDB participants (26.8 vs 33.1 vs 40.1 vs 50.9%). In multiple linear regression, PSQI global score showed significant positive association with BP levels in total, SDB and non-SDB participants, consistent in sensitivity analysis by excluding participants who were taking antihypertensives, and in participants aged <60 years in age-stratified analysis. In multivariable logistic regression, odds ratio for presence of hypertension significantly increased from very good to very bad sleepers in total (1 vs 1.08 vs 1.22 vs 1.48), SDB (1 vs 1.17 vs 1.35 vs 1.28) and non-SDB participants (1 vs 1.05 vs 1.14 vs 1.53), consistent in participants aged <60 years.

Conclusion: Poor subjective sleep quality is significantly associated with higher BP and prevalent hypertension, independent of SDB in the young- and middle-aged general population, indicating potential of improving sleep quality to lower BP and optimize hypertension management at population level.

Keywords: blood pressure; prevalent hypertension; sleep disordered breathing; sleep quality.

Grants and funding

The study was funded by grants from Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Regional Collaborative Innovation Project (SCO Science and Technology Partnership programme and International Science and technology Cooperation Programme) (2018E01014) and National Key Research and Development Program (Study on the appropriate techniques for hypertension prevention and control and the establishment and demonstration application of management platform) (2018YFC1311503).