Eating Behaviors Are Associated with Excessive Daytime Sleepiness among female adolescents

Background: Excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) is a common sleep abnormality among adolescents, and it’s associated with increased risk of morbidity and mortality. We aimed to explore the relationships between eating behaviors and EDS among female adolscents.MethodsIn this cross-sectional study 988 Iranian adolescent girls aged between 12-18 years old were recruited. Presence of EDS was determined by the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, and eating behaviors was assessed by a pre-validated questionnaire. To investigate the association between dietary behaviors and the prevalence of EDS, we applied logistic regression analysis in crude and adjusted models (adjustments for age, physical activity, menstruation and second hand smoke and general obesity).ResultsThe prevalence of esccesive daytime sleepiness was obtained 24.3. The participants who consumed a major meal three times daily had a 0.56 lower odds for EDS compared to those who consumed a single major meal (OR: 0.46, 95% CI: 0.21- 0.91). Individuals with a ‘high-rate of food chewing’ were less likely to have EDS (OR: 0.55, 95% CI: 0.29 -1.04) compared with low and moderate rate of food chewing. Compared with those who consumed fried or spicy foods daily, individuals who never consumed fried (OR: 1.8, 95% CI: 0.55- 5.86) or spicy foods (OR: 1.71, 95% CI: 0.55- 5.29) had a greater risk for EDS. In addition, there were direct associations between lower meal regularity (OR: 0.53, 95% CI: 0.29- 0.95) and intra-meal fluid intake (OR: 3.00, 95% CI: 1.2- 7.3) with EDS in adjusted models. Neither in the crude nor in the adjusted models, were there significant associations between breakfast intake and frequency of snack consumption with EDS.ConclusionThe lowest frequency of main meal frequency, irregular meal consumption, breakfast skipping, low rate of food chewing, intra-meal fluid intake, and consumption of spicy and fried foods were associated with increased odds of EDS. Further prospective studies are required to confirm this finding.