Factors affecting sleep quality of mothers of children with chronic illnesses

This present research, mothers of children with chronic illnesses were compared with mothers of children with no chronic illnesses with the aim of determining which factors affect their sleep quality.

The descriptive-type data obtained from this research were collected from 270 mothers of children with chronic illnesses and 197 mothers of healthy children between November 10 and December 10, 2021. All participants were asked to complete a survey. The data were assessed using IBM SPSS Statistics Version 25 and the chi-square test, Fisher's exact test, t-test, ANOVA (Analysis of Variance), and Logistic Regression Analysis.

The total mean The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) score for mothers of chronically ill children was found to be 9.79 ± 3.68 while it was 6.68 ± 3.62 for mothers of heathy children with a statically significant difference (t = 9.075, p = 0.00). The fact that mothers wake up for the care/treatment of their children due to the onset of an illness was found to be associated with poor sleep quality (OR = 0.388 p = 0.017; OR = 0.178, p = 0.000).

In the present study, it was determined that mothers of children with chronic illnesses suffer from sleep problems and that the sleep quality of those mothers varies depending on the illness types of their children.

Pediatric nurses are requested to assess the sleep quality of mothers with suitable measurement tools to determine what types of problems affect sleep quality negatively when dealing with children with chronic illnesses in both clinical and non-clinical practices.