The Association between Physical Activity and Sleep Disorders in Adolescents and Young Adults with Down syndrome: A Questionnaire Study

The high prevalence of sleep disorders is well documented in individuals with Down syndrome (DS). Thus, given the robust association between physical activity and sleep disorders in the typical population, more work is needed to examine this association in this population. The total of twenty-nine adolescents and young adults with DS participated in the current study. Parents reported on well-validated questionnaires to measure the levels of physical activity and sleep-related disorders in their children with DS. First, our result indicates that high active participants had lower parental reports of features associated with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) compared with low active participants. Further, after controlling for age and BMI, the levels of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity showed negative correlations with parental ratings of OSA. Both results suggest physical activity, in particular moderate-tovigorous intensity exercise, may determine the severity of OSA in adolescents and young adults with DS. Therefore, future work should consider the role of physical activity that may reduce the onset of sleep disorders in individuals with DS.