Sleep problems exact high toll in women with breast cancer

SAN ANTONIO — Sleep problems are common in women with breast cancer and often associated with poorer physical and mental health, a new study finds. Poor sleep quality and short sleep duration in particular were associated with poorer mental well-being.

“It’s important to ask patients [with breast cancer] about sleep and provide targeted interventions to improve sleep, when needed, to improve quality of life,” Lin Yang, PhD, with Cancer Care Alberta and University of Calgary, Canada, said in an interview.

The growing population of breast cancer survivors, particularly in developed countries, is burdened by a high prevalence of sleep problems, affecting more than half of the survivors, Dr. Yang said at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. 

The AMBER cohort study delved into how sleep health aspects, including sleep duration, timing, and quality, relate to the physical and mental well-being of women recently diagnosed with breast cancer. 

The study recruited 1409 women with newly diagnosed early-stage breast cancer from Edmonton and Calgary, Canada, between 2012 and 2019. 

The women completed the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) to assess habitual sleep duration and timing as well as sleep latency, efficiency, disturbance, medication, and daytime dysfunction and version two of the Short Form-36 (SF-36) to assess physical and mental well-being. 

Multivariable linear regressions were used to estimate the association of sleep characteristics with physical and mental well-being, adjusting for sociodemographic, disease, clinical, and lifestyle behavior factors.

Among the total patient cohort (mean age, 55 years), 41% experienced either short sleep duration (less than 6 h/d) or long sleep duration (more than 9 h/d), and the same percentage also reported regularly going to bed after 11 PM.

Of note, said Dr. Yang, in the multivariable model, short sleep duration was significantly associated with poorer mental well-being (beta-coefficient, -3.6; 95% CI, -4.7 to -2.4) but not poorer physical well-being (beta-coefficient, -1.5; 95% CI, -2.3 to -0.7). 

Sleep timing didn’t appear to have a meaningful impact on quality of life. 

However, poor sleep quality, measured through various metrics like sleep efficiency, disturbances, medication use, and daytime dysfunction, correlated with reduced physical and mental well-being, Dr. Yang said. 

She noted that targeted interventions to improve sleep health may lead to improvements in the quality of life among women with newly diagnosed breast cancer.

“Sleep is something we don’t necessarily think about in patients with breast cancer,” said Don Dizon, MD, with Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, discussant for the study presentation.

However, this study shows the “clinical significance” of sleep, he said. “Notably 35% of this population is taking a sleeping pill.” 

Dr. Yang is an editorial board member of the Journal of Healthy Eating and Active Living. Dr. Dizon receives consulting fees from Astra Zeneca, Glaxo Smith Kline, Kronos Bio, and Pfizer and industry grant support from Bristol-Myers Squibb.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

SAN ANTONIO — Sleep problems are common in women with breast cancer and often associated with poorer physical and mental health, a new study finds. Poor sleep quality and short sleep duration in particular were associated with poorer mental well-being.

“It’s important to ask patients [with breast cancer] about sleep and provide targeted interventions to improve sleep, when needed, to improve quality of life,” Lin Yang, PhD, with Cancer Care Alberta and University of Calgary, Canada, said in an interview.

The growing population of breast cancer survivors, particularly in developed countries, is burdened by a high prevalence of sleep problems, affecting more than half of the survivors, Dr. Yang said at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. 

The AMBER cohort study delved into how sleep health aspects, including sleep duration, timing, and quality, relate to the physical and mental well-being of women recently diagnosed with breast cancer. 

The study recruited 1409 women with newly diagnosed early-stage breast cancer from Edmonton and Calgary, Canada, between 2012 and 2019. 

The women completed the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) to assess habitual sleep duration and timing as well as sleep latency, efficiency, disturbance, medication, and daytime dysfunction and version two of the Short Form-36 (SF-36) to assess physical and mental well-being. 

Multivariable linear regressions were used to estimate the association of sleep characteristics with physical and mental well-being, adjusting for sociodemographic, disease, clinical, and lifestyle behavior factors.

Among the total patient cohort (mean age, 55 years), 41% experienced either short sleep duration (less than 6 h/d) or long sleep duration (more than 9 h/d), and the same percentage also reported regularly going to bed after 11 PM.

Of note, said Dr. Yang, in the multivariable model, short sleep duration was significantly associated with poorer mental well-being (beta-coefficient, -3.6; 95% CI, -4.7 to -2.4) but not poorer physical well-being (beta-coefficient, -1.5; 95% CI, -2.3 to -0.7). 

Sleep timing didn’t appear to have a meaningful impact on quality of life. 

However, poor sleep quality, measured through various metrics like sleep efficiency, disturbances, medication use, and daytime dysfunction, correlated with reduced physical and mental well-being, Dr. Yang said. 

She noted that targeted interventions to improve sleep health may lead to improvements in the quality of life among women with newly diagnosed breast cancer.

“Sleep is something we don’t necessarily think about in patients with breast cancer,” said Don Dizon, MD, with Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, discussant for the study presentation.

However, this study shows the “clinical significance” of sleep, he said. “Notably 35% of this population is taking a sleeping pill.” 

Dr. Yang is an editorial board member of the Journal of Healthy Eating and Active Living. Dr. Dizon receives consulting fees from Astra Zeneca, Glaxo Smith Kline, Kronos Bio, and Pfizer and industry grant support from Bristol-Myers Squibb.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

SAN ANTONIO — Sleep problems are common in women with breast cancer and often associated with poorer physical and mental health, a new study finds. Poor sleep quality and short sleep duration in particular were associated with poorer mental well-being.

“It’s important to ask patients [with breast cancer] about sleep and provide targeted interventions to improve sleep, when needed, to improve quality of life,” Lin Yang, PhD, with Cancer Care Alberta and University of Calgary, Canada, said in an interview.

The growing population of breast cancer survivors, particularly in developed countries, is burdened by a high prevalence of sleep problems, affecting more than half of the survivors, Dr. Yang said at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. 

The AMBER cohort study delved into how sleep health aspects, including sleep duration, timing, and quality, relate to the physical and mental well-being of women recently diagnosed with breast cancer. 

The study recruited 1409 women with newly diagnosed early-stage breast cancer from Edmonton and Calgary, Canada, between 2012 and 2019. 

The women completed the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) to assess habitual sleep duration and timing as well as sleep latency, efficiency, disturbance, medication, and daytime dysfunction and version two of the Short Form-36 (SF-36) to assess physical and mental well-being. 

Multivariable linear regressions were used to estimate the association of sleep characteristics with physical and mental well-being, adjusting for sociodemographic, disease, clinical, and lifestyle behavior factors.

Among the total patient cohort (mean age, 55 years), 41% experienced either short sleep duration (less than 6 h/d) or long sleep duration (more than 9 h/d), and the same percentage also reported regularly going to bed after 11 PM.

Of note, said Dr. Yang, in the multivariable model, short sleep duration was significantly associated with poorer mental well-being (beta-coefficient, -3.6; 95% CI, -4.7 to -2.4) but not poorer physical well-being (beta-coefficient, -1.5; 95% CI, -2.3 to -0.7). 

Sleep timing didn’t appear to have a meaningful impact on quality of life. 

However, poor sleep quality, measured through various metrics like sleep efficiency, disturbances, medication use, and daytime dysfunction, correlated with reduced physical and mental well-being, Dr. Yang said. 

She noted that targeted interventions to improve sleep health may lead to improvements in the quality of life among women with newly diagnosed breast cancer.

“Sleep is something we don’t necessarily think about in patients with breast cancer,” said Don Dizon, MD, with Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, discussant for the study presentation.

However, this study shows the “clinical significance” of sleep, he said. “Notably 35% of this population is taking a sleeping pill.” 

Dr. Yang is an editorial board member of the Journal of Healthy Eating and Active Living. Dr. Dizon receives consulting fees from Astra Zeneca, Glaxo Smith Kline, Kronos Bio, and Pfizer and industry grant support from Bristol-Myers Squibb.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.