A - 27 A Preliminary Investigation of the Relationship between Sleep Symptoms and Post-Concussion Cognitive Performance in Adolescents

Abstract

To explore the relationship between self-reported sleep symptoms and post-concussion cognitive test performance in adolescents on Immediate Post-Concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing (ImPACT). 54 adolescents (ages 12–16) referred to a specialized sports concussion private practice completed post-concussion ImPACT. Five symptom clusters were derived from the post-concussion symptom scale: sleep, physical, cognitive, affective, and headache. Two-factor cognitive composites from the ImPACT (memory and speed) were the outcome variables. Multivariate linear regression was conducted to examine the relationship between cognitive variables and sleep symptoms. Post-hoc forward stepwise linear regressions were used to explore the following potential additional predictors of cognitive outcomes: age, number of previous concussions, sex, hours slept the night before, and five symptom clusters. Sleep symptoms were significantly associated with cognitive performance, F(1,52) = 9.95, p < 0.001, ƞ2 = 0.28. Higher sleep symptom cluster scores were associated with worse memory, F(1,53) = 13.68, p < 0.001, ƞ2 = 0.21, and speed performance, F(1,53) = 17.84, p < 0.001, ƞ2 = 0.26. Results of post-hoc forward stepwise linear regressions revealed that a final model for speed performance included only the sleep symptom cluster, explaining 16.6% of the variance. The final model for memory performance included only the headache rating, explaining 20.1% of the variance. Our results indicate that severity of self-reported sleep symptoms post-concussion are associated with cognitive performance in domains of memory and speed. After considering additional predictors, more severe sleep symptoms were significantly associated with worse speed performance and worse headache severity was significantly associated with memory performance.