[The nocturnal eating syndrome (2 case reports and polysomnography)]

The nocturnal eating syndrome (NES) is a nocturnal sleep disorder caused by repeated awakening and the inability to fall a sleep again unless the patient ingests some food or drinks something. In children the NES is frequent, in adults rather rare and may be associated with various pathological conditions. The latter include in particular somnabulism, periodic movements of the lower extremities, narcolepsy, chronic triazolam intoxication, probably anorexia nervosa, and other eating disorders. The authors submit two case-histories of middle aged women (30 and 37 years old) without disturbances of the day-time eating behaviour, without obvious psychopathology where the symptomatology of NES developed slowly from the age of 14 and 25 years resp. Both patients ate at night small amounts of easily consumed foods which they went to fetch in the kitchen as often as five times per night. Their behaviour was calm and aimed. Usually they did not remember the nocturnal eating. Polysomnographic examination in both patients revealed poor sleep with frequent changes of the sleep stages, with frequent awakenings, in both patients incl. even awakening from deep NREM sleep. The authors conclude that in these two patients NES with somnabulism is involved.