Background: Although nocturnal asthma is a well documented clinical pr
oblem, the effect of asthma on sleep itself and morbidity caused there
by have not received adequate attention. It is now recognized that par
tial sleep deprivation has a considerable effect on human functions. O
bjectives: With this in view, we conducted a study to determine the oc
currence and nature of sleep disturbances in a homogeneous group of pa
tients with clinically stable bronchial asthma in their home environme
nt. Methods: Thirty young adult unmarried university students with cli
nically stable bronchial asthma attending the Institute's outpatient d
epartment were asked to respond to an asthma/sleep questionnaire and w
ere requested to maintain a sleep diary for 1 week. A similar group of
30 unmarried healthy young university students also underwent an iden
tical workup and functioned as controls. Ten subjects from each group
maintained a peak expiratory flow rate (PEFR) diary.Results: The quest
ionnaire revealed that 28 (93%) of the 30 patients experienced sleep d
isturbances (average 2.7/subject) as compared to 10 (33%) subjects in
the control group (average 0.4/subject). The sleep diary confirmed tha
t 27 (90%) of the 30 patients had sleep disturbances (2.4/subject/wk)
as compared with 8 (27%) subjects (0.3/subject/wk) in the control grou
p. These differences were statistically significant. Daytime sleepines
s and tiredness (63%) and difficulty in maintaining sleep (60%) along
with early morning awakening (46%) were more frequently seen. The asth
matic patients also had a shorter duration of sleep (427 min) as compa
red with the controls (474 min). These findings were significantly dif
ferent from the control group. Conclusions: Increased daytime sleepine
ss and tiredness was perhaps a reflection of the poor quality of sleep
experienced by patients with clinically stable asthma. This consequen
tly may lead to impaired daytime performance which can have a potentia
lly serious effect for the patient and society.