Sleep Duration in Association with Oxidative Stress and Anxiety/Depression

Sleep Duration in Association with Oxidative Stress and Anxiety/Depression
Susan Darroudi,¹ Mohammad Zamiri Bidary,² Payam Sharifan,³ Sina Danesteh,⁴ Majid Ghayour-Mobarhan,^5,*
1. Mashhad University of Medical Sciences
2. Mashhad University of Medical Sciences
3. Mashhad University of Medical Sciences
4. Mashhad University of Medical Sciences
5. Mashhad University of Medical Sciences
Introduction: From an evolutionary point of view, sleep is a vital behavior for human beings. It has been demonstrated that sleep is closely associated with metabolic, psychiatric, cardiovascular, and immune system disorders. Nowadays, there are some controversies on the association between sleep duration, oxidative stress determinants, and the severity of anxiety and depression. Thus, in this study, we have decided to investigate their relationship in a cross-sectional analysis of a populated metropolis in the middle east region.
Methods: As a part of the Mashhad Stroke and Atherosclerotic Disorders (MASHAD) cohort, 9184 subjects were included in our cross-sectional study. Sleep duration was recorded within a complete 24 hours using a self-report questionnaire. After excluding night shift workers, subjects were divided into very short sleep (<5h), short sleep (5-7h), and normal sleep (>7h) subgroups based on the duration of their nocturnal sleep. Pro-oxidant/antioxidant balance (PAB) and superoxide dismutase enzyme (SOD1) activity were measured for all subjects by standard methods. Beck anxiety inventory (BAI) and Beck depression inventory (BDI) questionnaires were used for anxiety and depression assessment; 0-13, 14-19, 20-28, and 29-63 scores of BDI were classified as minimal, mild, moderate, and severe depression, respectively. In addition, the following classification was used for anxiety according to BAI: minimal (0-7), mild (8-15), moderate (16-25), and severe (26-63). SPSS version 18.0 was used for performing statistical analysis with consideration of p-value under 0.05 as significant.
Results: In a crude model, our analysis found a substantial difference in PAB and depression and anxiety scores between subgroups of sleep duration. These factors were significantly higher in the very short sleep subgroup than the others. By Multivariate Analysis Of Variance (MANOVA), our results showed that just in anxious subjects, PAB level decreased by 10.721 and 11.690 HK in the short and normal sleep subgroup than the reference one (very short sleep). In addition, our analysis revealed that nocturnal sleep duration is considerably lower in severe depression and anxiety subjects than the others. Moreover, minimal anxiety and depression participants had a significantly lower level of PAB than the other subgroups of anxiety and depression severity.
Conclusion: Our cross-sectional study on a large sample of Mashhad citizens proved that nightly sleep deprivation (<5h) is substantially associated with increased PAB and severe depression and anxiety. Besides, PAB level was significantly related to the severity of anxiety and depression; However, SOD1 was not significantly associated with nocturnal sleep duration and depression/anxiety. More clinical cohort and case-control investigations are to clearly demonstrate the exact direction of these associations.
Keywords: Sleep; Sleep deprivation; PAB; Anxiety; Depression